mothers on the verge

Is anyone else also starting to feel that fashion is becoming impossible for a still vaguely youthful thirty-something to pull off without looking utterly ridiculous? The faux peasant look I could cope with. 70s retro - fabulous. 50s prom queen - difficult with a flat chest and no waist to speak of but not insurmountable. The tunic top and skinny jeans thing - lovely low maintenance and even my stumpy little legs can (just about) cope with it. But what's with this nu-rave and 80's fabulous nonsense? It's like I'm stuck in a teenage time warp and it wasn't any great shakes the first time around. Neon coloured Katherine Hamnett -style logo tee's? With clashing leggings? The Aceeed smiley face as a logo of choice? Puffball and ra - ra skirts? Give me a break. And scarier still, I keep spotting the hair style of desire for my 12-year-old self - the rat's tail (which thankfully my parents, who I thought were so mean and square at the time, refused to allow on ...

Happy fifth birthday Firstborn!

In honor of the temperatures finally (horribly) rolling into the 90s, I am taking the scary horrors known as my feet to a salon for a pedicure aptly tagged "The Works." I am not normally fond of shoes that show the toes. They always look fine on other people, but I often think my feet should be covered -- unless I am barefoot in the park, on the beach, etc. But on the street of Gotham? No thank you. However this year I have decided that I may try and give them some air -- and stave off the ghastly smell that tends to permeate most of my shoes by the end of August. So I bought a little silver pair of sandals, and am off to have my creatures buffed, waxed, peeled and shined. Let's see if The Works, works.

Sometimes when The Prince is working late I let the Rabbit have a "picnic dinner" which means we eat dinner in the living room and watch a movie. Tonight, dinner included some baby carrots. I get that some food items are prone to crumbs -- bread & butter, cookies, crackers. But carrots? A neat little pile of well, orange crumbs, now sits under her chair. Lovely.

I am in the midst of a dilemma. Admittedly, it's not much of a dilemma in the great scheme of things, nor is it causing me much in the way of sleepless nights (that honour goes to Alpha's snoring alongside the noctural adventures of the Small(er) One) but it is a dilemma nontheless. It's about jeans, you see. For years now I have been quite happy with basic Gap jeans. They are fairly cheap, come in a bigger range of styles, colours and sizes than anywhere else I can think of on the high street, and there are Gap stores everywhere, making a new purchase simple and fast. But recently my head is slowly but irreversibly being turned by all those swanky so-called designer jeans that have landed with a bang over the past few years - Seven, Citizens Of Humanity, True Religion, Sass & Bide, J Brand... ooh the list goes on and on and on... But the problem is that the very idea of paying between £150 and £200 for a pair of jeans seems somewhat decadent. There is, I think, someth...

I pick the Rabbit up from school today -- last day. She comes running across the playground, tears streaming down her face, and falls in a crumple in my arms. I am consoling her when one of her teachers comes up and says, "We had a hard time today at the end of the day." We? I walk with her to a shady corner of the sidewalk and the Rabbit starts to tell me how her teacher screamed at her -- twice -- today. Once for talking to another girl when she was supposed to be listening to teacher, another time because she was looking for her sparkle paint in her book bag as they were lining up to go home. Now I agree that she needs to pay attention to her teacher, and line-up time is supposed to be quiet, and their hands at their side. But screaming? I don't think so. The Rabbit says, "And what I did didn't need screaming." Love it. On her last day. Had to make her cry. Because she wanted to make sure she had everything before she left, and tried to talk to a friend. ...

grumpy

What is it about power struggles and going to the bathroom? I know this is only a HINT of what I am going to face come The Rabbit's teen years, and I am terrified. I can tell when she needs to go...she hops around like, a, well, rabbit, holding herself. But god forbid I would ask her if she needs to go, or worse, TELL her to go. She screams at me like I am asking her to take her beloved stuffed dog and throw him out the window. Or let me wash him. So we do this: I see her jumping. I say, "Let's go to the bathroom PLEASE." She screams. I back down. 20 minutes later. Repeat. 10 minutes Repeat with escalating voice levels. 12 minutes later, a hurried run to the bathroom and pee streaming down her legs, on to her clothes, her socks, the rug, with her smiling like, "You can't get me." Short of demanding she clean it up (She's 4...can I do this????? Don't send me hate mail....) I don't know what else to do except keep heading down to the laundry tw...

What is it with Crocs ? Has everyone in the world gone insane or am I just missing some crucial fashion point? Does my dislike of these plastic monstrosities mark me out as a member of the Fashion Clueless, or is this a case of the Emperor's New Clothes? But come on... why the hell would anyone want to slip their feet into a clumpy, lumpy piece of (usually) blindingly-coloured plastic, a kiddie-cartoon-on-acid version of traditional Dutch footwear? Yep, I'm sure they are comfortable. I've been told that they don't make your feet sweaty due to their cunningly placed holes (not exactly waterproof though, huh?). I guess they could even pass as quasi-cute in a kind of Paris Hilton way, i.e. if you squint really hard and/or have just gone crazy with the vodka shots - but with the same end result of overwhelming nausea. I just don't get it. Quite normal people clump about in these horrors without the grace to even look slightly embarrassed. Entire families are often seen...

Tonight The Prince is working late and so The Rabbit and I went out for pizza solo. It's not an unusual thing. Often I do the bedtime thing solo -- he takes her to school in the morning, so it's fair. But I can't remember having this much fun with The Rabbit in so long. She ate HALF A PIZZA! And drank orange juice, beat me at tic-tac-toe (really), drew me some flowers, made me laugh when she drooled out some orange juice while she was laughing, and then dropped ice cubes all the way home, stomping on them and then announcing it would make "them melt faster mama. Don't you know that?" It's late. She should be in bed. But, as The Rabbit is singing right now, "We're having a speeeeeciallll day!!!!!!"

Aggghhhh. I've been tagged - thanks Em ! OK, here goes... 8 random things about me I don't know my left from my right My first every boyfriend is now gay (not related to 1. above) I panic if my head goes under water I smoked my first spliff in Moscow in November 1990 I am half-American, a quarter Irish and a quarter British. Alpha is half Kiwi and half Fijian. Which makes the girls err... I avoid going out on Friday nights because Ugly Betty is on TV (lame, but true) My favorite novel of all time is Jay McInerney's Story of My Life I still can't ride a bicycle properly, but I can ice-skate backwards I think this tagging thing means I am now obliged to spread the joy, so Kim , Mary Mary , Lucinda and Kris , consider yourselves well and truly tagged.

The Rabbit has eczema -- a skin condition we discovered after she screamed about her feet itching for 2 weeks, tried athletes foot goo stuff, had the flakiness biopsed, had two doctors check her out (including her grandfather) and finally went to the head of Columbia U's dermatology department who took one look and said, "Yep, eczema." So considering her skin flakes at the slightest irritation, we are prone to carrying vaseline around with us. Recently we found that sunscreen caused her skin to itch. And since she is not about to walk around WITHOUT sunscreen (if you ever saw how my skin creates a glare from the whiteness you'd understand) we have allowed her to pack a little bottle of vaseline with her to school everyday. (pause) Just a moment here to let your brain start working. I picked her up from school today and she shined. Not her skin. Oh no. Her pants. Her shirt. Her hair. Her shoes! She crinkled from the stuff. Couldn't have gotten a better sheen from ...

Yes, I am a bad blogger. I keep thinking about all the things I would like to write about, in fact I compose many (I fondly imagine) witty and insightful posts on the tube while being squished into a sweaty heap by all the other (larger and meaner) commuters, but with one thing and another they never actually make it onto the page. If only I could post directly via my brain I'd be OK. I've gone past being 'blah' and now have morphed into 'insanely busy' which means I don't have any time whatsoever to think about anything else except the next work deadline and trying to keep the kids clean, fed, watered, hugged and kissed, and dropped off at school or nursery on time. Sometimes when I have a few moments to kill I manage to wash their clothes and check their book bags for notes from school, which always feels like an astounding achievement. Sometimes I even manage to converse pleasantly and collapse in front of the telly with an equally exhausted Alpha Male. I...

Thankfully, you say. Something not about SCHOOL!!!! Yes, it's true. I found the coolest Web site in the world last week as I sat on the computer, surfing the Web like a drunk sucking back limoncellos. Try it: Illegal Art . You'll love it. And then head to one of their current projects: Lost and Found . And no, I haven't recorded anything. But I highly recommend calling in. For those in the UK, and beyond, remember to dial the 01 in front. (Yes, I am sure you all know this and I am revealing yet another embarrassing American sign of stupidity.....but I am too lost in my stupor to care...)

The Prince says that if I feel strongly about something it's written all over my face. Bluntly? I am not good at hiding my emotion. True true. Honestly, if I don't like someone, I can barely actually look at them. (But don't think that means I don't have a mean poker face. Poker is not an emotional game and I don't care if I win or lose -- which means I am damn good at bluffing.) So given my emotive facial map, you can imagine what's been going on with me at The Rabbit's school. I can't look at the teacher. I usually work in the classroom once afternoon a week. Thankfully I had a hideous case of food poisoning on my designated day last week. (Believe me, I preferred this.) But with the next one looming up (and thankfully the last) I know I have to get out of it or risk foaming at the mouth during Circle Time. Given that there are just a few weeks left, and many half days strewn in between, I feel comfortable with bowing out for work reasons .... and maki...

Sugarmama made a good point to me in the comments that how much about our earlier teachers do we actually remember? I think she's right. And also right that having friends around is important. But then it got me thinking last night, as I was nursing my return to the living from a bout with food poisoning, and I realized I remember a lot about mine. And I really remembered the ones who didn't seem to jive with me. So here's to the teachers I do remember -- and loved: Preschool, Mrs. Grace: taught me how to draw my belly button on a picture. Let me feed our pet parrot birdseed. Called my mom when I told her that, "Mrs. Grace, I didn't come to school to work. I came to play." See? Already someone helping me from turning to the dark side. Kindergarten: Bad teacher. Don't remember her name. But she made me practice my letters all the time at my desk. Lame. And never paid attention to me. I remember that. 1st Grade: Mrs. Phillips. Had an awesome rug in the libra...

I don't understand why The Rabbit fights me on everything. So after this experience with her teacher, I actually did start to wonder. Was any of it true? I've been discovering, actually, that The Rabbit is doing stuff without telling anyone. Like reading. Like sounding out words. But she won't tell her teacher. AND SHE WILL BARELY SHOW ME. And when I ask her, she fights me, she walks away, she ignores me. I actually can barely stand it. It's not like I don't know the feeling. I remember when my parents had a teacher/parents conference and came home and said I should be reading harder books and decided I should start Pride and Prejudice. And so they bought it for me and told me to read it. And asked me. Every day. And every day I refused. Said I couldn't understand it. Said I hated it. Said it was too hard for me. BECAUSE I HATED THAT THEY WERE MAKING ME. So I get it. I really get it. Problem is, on the other side of the fence, I don't know what to do except ...

You know all those times when you're presented in life two paths: A hard one and an easier one? And both could make you happy? I've done my share of choosing between the two -- and have to say that I split the choices fairly evenly. Easy choices? Staying with The Prince and turning down big job offers in cities far away when we were dating. (Worked out? Yes with The Prince, career took a hit.) Hard choices? Moving back to New York from London after finally settling in, and wanting to really make a go of it in Europe. (Worked out? Career took off, had The Rabbit, endured many tough spots....) To me it seems like a question of choices that generate comfort, and choices that build character. And I want both. So here I am with The Rabbit's choices in my hand. Which is almost worse because who is to say I should be entrusted with choices for another person? The easy choice? Keep her at a school where she knows tons of kids, where she can sleep in later and walk there from home, ...

I'm feeling kind of dull at the moment which is why I haven't been on the blog much. I just don't have all that much to say. I could go on about how Alpha and I are starting to plan our new kitchen extension which we just got the planning permission through for, but I'm pretty confident that the dilemma of which colour units to go for is not going to generate much excitement in anyone but us. I could tell you about how hectic work has been but I'm kind of sick of grumbling about long hours and pissy clients. Yawn. Big. Fat. Yawn. I could talk about the kids, but you know, they're absolutely fine. It's all good bar a few tantrums and a current obsession for pulling their pants down and mooning anyone who walks into the house but I'm not going to sweat that right now (although if they're still doing it in five years then it might be an idea to address the issue). I could have a small rant about how rude people are in London, but that isn't anything...

Here we go. Feel free to steal this, which I know, I know, no one will because it is TOO LAME but I have to do it: List 5 things you are grateful for RIGHT NOW (without thinking) 1. The Rabbit's health 2. My health 3. The Prince's health 4. The fact we have a safe place to live and can sleep tonight. 5. The fact that my family is for the most part happy. List 5 things you would change about your situation RIGHT NOW (again without thinking) 1. Get the Rabbit into the school program where I want her. 2. Get this gig I know I would be AWESOME AT and start. 3. Get The Prince the dream job he so deserves. 4. STOP FEELING NUTS WHEN I GET SCARED. 5. Turn me into a permanent size 6 so my size 8 pants would never feel tight again. List 5 things you would change about your SELF, right now, without thinking. 1. Make me more calm. 2. Make me appreciate what I have. 3. Make me confident in my writing. 4. Make me NEVER lose my temper with the Rabbit. 5. Make my feet callous free. (Yes, lame,...