Just the stepmom

Oh my. Is it really almost Christmas? Really? Sheesh. Where did all the time go?

Wild is gone for Christmas this year. She is with her birth mother, the woman who hasn't been able to spare more than 1/2 hour for her since she was born.

Yes, it was Wild's decision to spend this holiday with a family of complete strangers. The Hubster and I decided that even though we'd much rather have her home, we also weren't going to stand in her way or stop her from seeing this woman. She's old enough to make that kind of decision.

Am I hurt and angry? You betcha. Yeah, I'm only the stepmom, but dammit, I've been "only the stepmom" for 11 years. I've been there for every up and down, every hormonal freak-out and breakdown, every good thing, every breakup and disappointment. Her birth mother has NEVER been there. She hasn't been there for Wild at all but for some reason, Wild has put the woman up on a pedestal. In her mind, this woman can do no wrong. Nevermind she hasn't been a mother at all and has disappointed far more often than not.

When the Egg Donor arrived to pick Wild up Sunday evening it was the first EVER that I've seen her. In 11 years, I'd never seen her before. She looked to be about 50 years old (even though she is younger than me), was missing quite a few teeth and smelled funky, like stale cigarettes, old body odor and mold. Imagine a meth addict and you'll have a pretty good idea of what I saw, stringy, unwashed hair and all.

That is what my daughter left with. Was I uncomfortable with letting a stranger leave with Wild? Beyond description. But, again. I'm just the stepmom, there isn't a damn thing I can do about it.

Unruly doesn't really understand why her sister didn't want to spend Christmas with us, and I really didn't know how to explain it without getting ugly about it. So, I kept my mouth halfway shut and just said she wanted to spend some time with her "real mom." I think she accepted that.

So, Hubster and I are going to wrap presents tonight, and stuff just one stocking. Unruly and I will make cookies for Santa and sprinkle some "reindeer food" in the yard. We'll open gifts tomorrow morning, I'll bake a ham and in the afternoon we'll go see "Bedtime Stories."

We won't have snow, we'll have freezing rain, again. To add to the mud and freezing rain we've had for the past month.

Merry Christmas.

Trials and Tribulations

A cross-post from my "professional" work blog at www.bnd.com:

Do you ever have those weeks where you just want to foist your kids off on someone else for awhile? Or wonder, maybe for a moment, why the heck you EVER thought it was a good idea to become a parent?

Yeah. It's been one of those weeks. And the week didn't get any better. There were some days I tried to come up with all kinds of extra work at the office so I could put off going home. That didn't work too well, they just called and harassed me at work. "When are you coming home? What are we having for dinner? Can I have a snack? Have you seen my library books? Where are my blue pants? So and so said such and such about whatsitsname...blah blah blah blah...."

It wasn't just a normal bad kid week. It was a bad bad kid week. Unruly got kicked off the bus. Again. Yes, my second grader is well on her way to becoming a delinquent. This is the second time she's been booted from the bus for bad behavior so she already has a rap sheet.

Why was she foisted from the bus this time? Oh. Because she punched two kids in the face. Just. Like. That. Wham. Wham.

"Mom, they kept picking on me and wouldn't leave me alone even though I asked them to leave me alone, so I hit them." Of course, to hear her tell it, she didn't mean to hit them in the face, she meant to push them away, the face punching thing was an accident. I was torn between giving her a high five for standing up for herself and locking her little fingers in one of those Chinese finger torture devices for hitting. Hitting isn't allowed, she knows this.

It's one of those fine lines a parent tiptoes. I do want her to stand up for herself, I do want her to be able to tell someone "no" when they are doing something she doesn't like and expect they will comply. I don't want to raise a little wimp who sits back and refuses to stick up for herself and is the one who gets beat up because she's a little pansy. But when do you cross that line from self-defense to assault? It can be a tough conversation to have with a 7-year-old!

So, she lost her bus privileges. On what planet is this a punishment for kids? It's a punishment to parents, no doubt, but she was loving it. Instead of spending 45 minutes on the big stinky, noisy bus, she got chauffeured to the school's front door in about 10 minutes. She got to sleep in for a week because she didn't have to catch the bus. How is that punishment?

She did lose her TV privileges for the week and I found some pretty boring chores for her to do. Whether that works remains to be seen.

Have I mentioned the craptacular kids behavior comes in pairs? No? They do. While I'm dealing with the youngest's inability to keep her little fists to herself, I'm also dealing with the oldest's inability to remember to do homework of any kind. I have not seen her bring home a single book all year long, and she is failing classes. At this rate she'll be lucky to graduate from high school before she turns 21.

I ask, every day, "do you have homework? Do you need help with homework? Did you bring anything home to study?" And every day, the answer is the same, "I did my homework at school and I don't 'have anything to study." I know she's lying, but how do I prove she didn't do her homework at school? She's 16 and she's responsible for assuring her homework is done. I can't go digging through her locker every day for homework and calling teachers at night to double check assignments. She's 16, she's past the age that I should be following up behind her to make sure she did her homework. Heck, I can't even get her to bring one. freaking. textbook. home.

Friday I got a call from her English teacher. She's failing English even worse than before (how low can an F really go?) and neglected to turn in a pretty big assignment. An assignment that was apparently mostly completed IN CLASS. How the heck do you not turn something in that you've done in class? I don't understand and she has so far been unable to explain this particular phenomenon.

Between the KO Queen and the Homework Evader, I'm at my wits end. I wonder how much I'd get for them on Craigslist...

Mom, the bus smells bad

And...the girls are back in school! Someone please 'splain to me the intelligence of having the first day of school on a Friday...then making that day a half day? Oh, and to follow that up with a week of school that gets out two hours early every day? What?

Anyway, for a couple of kids who bitched and moaned about NOT wanting to start school, they were sure up bright, early and eager on the morning of the First Day. All went well, except for the fact that Wild's school is still not completed. She said students were relegated to the gym when they were there because the renovations and updates on the high school aren't done. They weren't able to get their lockers because they were all torn out and there are none yet. So, hopefully the workers will get off their butts and finish up the renovations by Monday!

The bus smells bad, according to Unruly. I understand that bus smell, and it is bad. Very bad. Stinky, sweaty little kids and stinky, sweaty hormonal teens a sweet smelling bus does not create.

Unruly seems to like her teacher and she was utterly amazed that she knew everyone in her 2nd grade class this year. In a 2nd grade class of about 60 students total, I think she's going to find it hard not to know someone. Since kindergarten there has been one, yup, just one, brand new student come to her class. Such is small town life.

The Hubster took both of them to have their hair cut the day before school. I know, I know, never a good idea to get it done that close to the First Day, but it needed to be done. Unruly was starting to look like a shaggy sheep dog, which is NOT a good look for her. Both girls got shag cuts, lots o' layers for their thick manes of obnoxious waves. Unruly is the spittin' image of her mama in the late '70s, poor kid.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Unruly will have a good school year without too many misbehavior issues and that Wild will actually pass all of her classes each semester. Hey, one can dream, right?

Mommy fails, again

I am a bad, bad mom. The worst sort possible. I'm a forgetful mom and Unruly reminds me CONSTANTLY how forgetful I can be. "Did you forget, AGAIN, mom? Sheesh." Not an uncommon phrase around here.

Yesterday Unruly lost yet another tooth. Of course, she went and lost it because she couldn't seem to keep her teeth off another little kid's WebKinz. They were playing lions, or something equally silly, and Unruly attacked that WebKinz with ferocity, yanking out a loose tooth in the process.

Anyway...the Tooth Fairy seems to be just as forgetful as Unruly's old mom. Despite carefully tucking the tooth beneath the child's pillow, the Tooth Fairy failed to materialize and leave the loot behind. I feel terrible and she was SO disappointed.

Of course, I had to come up with some kind of creative excuse for the Tooth Fairy's lax ways, right? "Maybe she couldn't find your tooth, honey," I offered hopefully.

"Mom, she's the TOOTH FAIRY of course she can find it!"

"Well, maybe LOTS of kids lost their teeth yesterday and her schedule was too packed to get to yours last night. You did go to bed kind of late," I explain. Surely she'll buy into that excuse, right?

"Hmmm...maybe. I dunno," she contemplated.

"You can try again tonight," I said, mentally admonishing myself to REMEMBER to leave the cash and take the tooth tonight.

"Hmmm...okay. But if she doesn't remember again, I'm telling Santa she was a bad Tooth Fairy."

We know what our food ate

We've tried to raise the girls with a healthy attitude towards food. Specifically, towards meat. They know where it comes from. They know that steak and hamburger was once a cow, bacon, a hog and venison is Bambi.

For them, meat doesn't start out all clean and neatly wrapped up in cellophane in the refrigerated section at the grocery store. They know the meat we eat once had a face and I honestly think that makes them respect and appreciate our food a little more.

Unruly isn't a big meat eater. She never has been, even once telling me she just doesn't like the way it tastes. The child will eat a plate heaped with broccoli and spinach and lima beans before she'll even think about chewing on a piece of steak or munching on a hamburger. I'm okay with that.

Recently the whole "where does your food come from" knowledge has taken on a whole new spin.

Meet one of The Ducks.

We have eight of these giant Pekins. This one is only 3 weeks old and is already nearly the size of a chicken.

None of these ducks have names. Can you guess why?

These guys are eatin' ducks. They will go from yard to freezer at the end of May. Unruly has been okay with the idea of them being food since we impressed it upon her at the very beginning when they were just cute little balls of yellow fluff. Sometimes she says she feels bad that they will die, but she understands where her food comes from. She's actually expressed an interest in trying duck l'orange or roasted duck with cherry sauce, which kind of surprised me.

I like knowing our future roasted ducklings have been raised humanely with kindness and with consideration about what a duck needs to be happy and healthy. They've had an opportunity to swim, bask in the sun, catch bugs and eat grass. Something all those factory raised ducks and chickens never get to do.

These little girls, on the other hand: Aren't for eatin'. They're for egg layin'.

This is a Rainbow Egg Layer mix...meaning we'll get blue, green, white, brown, beige and speckled eggs from them when they grow up to be hens in a few months. Cool, eh?

And this unusual-looking thing?Is a Guinea hen. Hubby says they're "ugly." I prefer to view them as "artistic." And their purpose in life is to amuse me with their antics...and to eat bugs. Mmmm...yummy!

Booted from the bus

So, Unruly got kicked off the bus. Again. For fighting.

But the other kid got kicked off too, so it's not ALL her fault. Apparently my little sadomasochist was inciting this 3rd grade boy to punch her over and over. She says her winter coat "felt like armor" and she wanted to see how hard he had to hit her before it hurt.

Well, he finally hit hard enough to hurt and kept hitting. So she retaliated by kicking him in his boy-parts. And he retaliated by punching her in the face and bloody-ing her lip. Nice, eh?

Explain to me how kicking her off the bus for two days is any kind of punishment for her? She HATES riding the bus, so it's a welcome reprieve from having to ride the stink-mobile. Her banishment from the bus is, however, punishment for me because I have to take her to school and pick her up. What kind of pain in the ass is that? Twenty minutes in the opposite direction I have to go for work. Which makes my commute to work about an hour-and-a-half instead of an hour. That half hour makes a BIG difference in my level of tolerance for being in the truck and on the road.

I got kicked off the bus a few times when I was in school. I never got kicked off when I was in kindergarten or first grade though! Maybe that's because I walked to school. But, I digress. I was booted from the big yellow weinie for fighting. I guess the fruit doesn't fall too far from the tree, eh?

Wild has shared with us, a few times now, that there are a couple of boys on the bus who keep grabbing her butt and boobs. As many times as we've offered to step in and report the touching, she gets upset and says that will just make it worse for her and she'll handle it herself. So far it doesn't seem like she's handling it so well. It's sexual harassment, pure and simple, and no one should have to put up with that, ever. Period.

One of the times I got kicked off the bus was for retaliating to sexual harassment that just. wouldn't. stop. No matter how many times I complained. No matter where I sat or how much I threatened him with bodily violence, this big, jerky, mean, ugly DORK grabbed my girly parts every day on the bus. He thought it was funny and was probably getting his jollies off my discomfort and anger.

It finally got to the point where I could take it no more. He crossed the line and bruised my boob with his big, grabbing, pinching hands.

I clobbered him upside the head with my clarinet case. And clobbered him and clobbered him. I couldn't stop. I'm pretty sure he was bleeding and well-beaten by the time I got done.

I got kicked off the bus for defending myself.

I don't want it to get to that point with Wild. So, despite her assurances that she "can handle it," I'm going to step in and start filing reports with the school district. If they do nothing, I'll take it a step further and file reports with the police department. Because no matter where it takes place, it's still sexual harassment and it's against the law.

The final straw

As many of you know, Wild is my stepdaughter. Her mother has been pretty much absent from her life since I've been around, about 10 years. Every couple of years she'd pop back in to her life, make a phone call or two, make promises and break them, then pop back out of her life again leaving us to clean up the emotional mess.

A few months ago she resurfaced, wanting to "get to know" the daughter she never showed any interest in before. I had my doubts, my trepidations, but being the child of a father who pretty much did the same thing to me, I put those fears and doubts aside and encouraged Wild to try to develop a relationship with her Egg Donor. Everything seemed to be going okay, she was calling fairly regularly and Wild seemed happy about it.

The Egg Donor requested Christmas with Wild, which I wasn't thrilled about. I had a bad, bad feeling about it, but I kept my feelings to myself and stepped out of the way. I'm just the stepmom and I'm not going to be a roadblock in any relationship they might want to try to pursue. The Egg Donor is her mom, regardless of her crappy status, and I don't want Wild to have the same regrets I did when my dad died.

So, the pickup date was scheduled for the morning of Dec. 21. Wild was going to be gone until Dec. 31. She was going to spend that time getting to know the Egg Donor better. She did her laundry, cleaned her room, packed her suitcase and waited for the Egg Donor to arrive to pick her up.

Still, I had my doubts. I didn't want to have doubts, but I did. This woman does not have a good track record. She is not reliable nor is she responsible. But I kept my mouth shut.

The afternoon of Dec. 21 arrived and still no Egg Donor. A call was made, a conversation had. She hadn't even left her home state of Texas yet. Promises were made that she would be there by the evening of Dec. 22.

Dec. 22 comes and goes. No Egg Donor, more excuses.

Dec. 23, the same. No Egg Donor, more excuses. Wild was understandably hurt and angry yet still clinging to the last shreds of hope that the Egg Donor would come through and make her word good. Clinging to the hope that just once she would follow through on her promises.

Christmas Eve day. No Egg Donor. No calls. Nothing. Have I mentioned that I did very, very little Christmas shopping for Wild because she wasn't going to be her Christmas morning? I intended to take advantage of the after-Christmas sales for gifts to open when she came home on Dec. 31. This was not going to be a good Christmas for her. And I feel responsible.

10:30 Christmas Eve. Still no Egg Donor. Still no calls. Wild had been calling the Egg Donor's cell phone every half an hour, just to get a status check. All calls went unanswered.

My worst fears were realized. The Egg Donor wasn't coming. We would have to have to talk to Wild and ease her through the incredible disappointment, the anger, the sadness.

Once again we are left to clean up the emotional mess the Egg Donor made.

She was most angry with herself for believing that this time it would be different. She said she felt so stupid, so gullible for having hoped the Egg Donor would keep her promises this time. She cried. Oh, she cried. And my heart broke for this girl who only wanted to get to know this stranger who birthed her a little better.

I know how she feels, I know the anger and the heartbreak, the disappointment and the feeling of rejection. All the things I didn't want her to feel. All the things I wish I could have sheltered her from.

The Egg Donor drove the final nail into her own relationship coffin with Wild this time. I don't think there is going to be any coming back from this one.

Good riddance. And all I have to say is: "Stay away from my daughter, you bitch."

Rules are rules and I'm a bitch

Wild will be 16 in a few short months, and as everyone knows, with that comes the opportunity to earn the privilege to operate a 2,000 pound killing machine.

And I'm having to stick to my guns about the rule I laid down about four years ago regarding her driving privileges. See, driving is a privilege, not a right, and teens have to earn that privilege, in my opinion. That privilege is earned with As and Bs on the report card as well as maintaining those grades while I'm the one forking out the dough for a significantly increased car insurance bill. Those privileges are also earned by showing a tad bit of responsibility for chores and personal obligations. She has fulfilled neither aspect in an effort to earn driving privileges.

Yesterday she brought home a note from the school informing us that we have to pony up $70 by next week so she can take the driving portion of driver's ed in January. The $70 includes a fee for getting a driver's license upon successful completion of the course, as well as a vision exam. Wait? Vision exam? Isn't that why I'm paying for vision insurance? Seems like a scam to me.

I reminded her of the A/B Rule. This is not the first time over the course of the last few years (and even more frequently over the past couple of months) that I've reminded her of the A/B Rule. She was pissed at me yesterday when I brought up the A/B Rule because surprise! Surprise! She doesn't have As and Bs. Not even close. She doesn't bring homework home and I've seen her studying perhaps twice the entire school year. Obviously, not much effort being made in that particular personal responsibility department

End of story, right? Bad grades = no driving/driver's license. Seems like a pretty simple equation to me.

But apparently it's not that simple. I'm having to be the bad guy in all of this and I'm starting to get the feeling that the A/B Rule is about to be tossed out by Hubby. No, he hasn't come right out and said it, but he's made some comments about it and that's the feeling I get. Needless to say, I'm NOT a happy camper about this particular turn of events.

We've discussed this, and I thought we agreed on the A/B Rule. But I guess I was wrong. And I get to be the bad guy bitch once again. Yay me.

Mess-making perfected

A few summers ago Wild, Unruly and I visited my mom in California. We had a blast, loved the mountains, loved the ocean, loved the weather. My mom and I did a lot of talking, as adults, and I left with a lot of good "child rearin'" and life advice from this seasoned veteran.

One little bit of wisdom I grabbed for myself wasn't part of any conversation between Mom and I. It was gleaned from a conversation between her and Unruly after a bath.

A preface: I have been accused of being OCD about my house. I notice when the knick-knacks on my shelves are out of whack by the slimmest margin and freak out at dust and dog hair. It's a losing battle most days. But my biggest battle has been with the young'uns about keeping the bathroom clean after bathing. Towels hung up, caps back on shampoo bottles and the bottles neatly placed back in their respective spots, toothpaste rinsed from the sink, drips wiped off the toilet seat, rugs flat, unwrinkled and unmarred by any bath-related substance of any kind. You get the idea. I'm a little OCD. And I'm okay with that.

Flashback once again to the conversation between Mom and Unruly. Mom hands a tub of baby powder and a duster-thingy to the then 3-year-old. Not a good combo in my humble opinion and just begging for a gigantic white, powdery mess. On the carpets. On the floor. On the shelves. On everything. But what do I know?

As predicted the kid starts covering her damp body with a smoky sheeth of white powder. The air is soon filled with clouds of the sweetly-scented stuff. I wait for Mom to quietly admonish her granddaughter about gently and neatly applying the powder.

And I wait. And wait.

Instead I hear this (Or close to, my memory can be a tad faulty after three years!): "Oh, that's okay, I make a big mess with the powder too! I just fling it everywhere. It gets on everything. I wasn't allowed to make a mess with the powder when I was a kid, so now that I'm all grown up, I just do what I want. I LOVE powder! Don't you?"

Of course, she made a mess. A big, white, powdery mess.

And Mom didn't flinch. Not a wince.

For the past three years Unruly has continued to make a powdery mess in the bathroom following nearly every bathing session. And I don't complain.

Because now I make a mess, too. And my head hasn't exploded yet.

What's the point of insurance?

Oooh, boy. So the expenses start. First it was the pricey metal adorning Wild's mouth. Still paying on that one.

Now it's six cavities in Unruly's molars that require drilling and filling. Poor kid. I managed to get through most of my life with just one cavity...that I got when I was 30 so she definitely didn't get my cavity-resistant pearly whites. I seriously wonder if her cavity-filled head has anything to do with living on well water her entire life. No flouride in that water source, just pure, unadultered water. We tried giving her the flouride drops to supplement, but after awhile, fighting with the kid every morning to get that nasty tasting stuff down was no longer fun. Does that make me a bad mom? Maybe. I dunno. Fortunately most of the cavities are in her baby teeth, so we'll get them fixed and hopefully it won't affect her permanent teeth.

Now, I'm going to complain. I have dental insurance for the girls and myself. Hubby has his own. I chose the "best" plan offered through my company and figured we'd be covered for this kind of crap.

Oh, how wrong I was. The total bill to get all those little buggers drilled and filled will be almost $900. *gasp!* Insurance covers just over $300 of the bill. Tell me why again I am paying into insurance every month when it doesn't cover much of anything at all? I feel so used by the insurance company right now. What a great big rip-off.

When I had to have three wisdom teeth pulled, the insurance covered all but $50 of the entire thing and I KNOW that cost more than filling a few cavities. I haven't changed insurance companies, so what gives?

If I were to place a classified ad

For rent or lease: 15-year-old know-it-all. Has perfected the eye-roll, the stomp-off, the heavy sigh of exasperation, the "you are SO stupid" look and the don't-talk-to-me glare. Doesn't eat much. In fact, rarely eats anything at all unless the main ingredient is sugar, chocolate or carbonated water. Constantly updates the "cluttered chic" look in her room. Likes to wear torn-up old clothes so shopping trips can be limited to Goodwill, thereby reducing the overalll expenses. Smells funny.

Is exceedingly talented at talking on the phone...she can rack up a $300 phone bill in less than 30 days! Pretty amazing, eh? Doesn't overtax herself with school work or chores so she remains quite healthy. Is up-to-date on all vaccinations, doctor's exams and dental work. Would rather not be home much so upkeep expenses can occasionally decrease significantly with her absence. However, the 30-minute showers and washing of just one pair of jeans at a time will cause the electric bill to rise on a regular basis.

Does require acute patience, an over-the-top sense of humor and some experience in dealing with mood extremes. A well-stocked liquor cabinet is a must.

And to add confusion to the mix

Is omission lying? If it is, I haven't been entirely honest with you guys about something.

I have two daughters, but only one is biological. One of them, Wild, is my stepdaughter. I have been "mom" to her since she was five and she has lived exclusively with us the entire time, so I view her as my daughter, rather than a stepdaughter. Make sense?

Why am I telling you this, you ask? Well, it's simple. After ten years of complete and absolute absence, Wild's "real" mom is trying really hard to be in the picture and I'm not quite sure how I feel about it. Because it's not just Wild she's trying to cultivate a relationship with, it's her ex-husband, my Hubby. She calls him nearly daily now, just to talk and looking for advice. She e-mails him and texts him and quite frankly, I'm getting a bit irritated about it. Who the hell does she think she is, being absent for a decade then suddenly deciding she can be buddy-buddy with MY husband and Wild?

Don't get me wrong, I think every kid should have a relationship with their parent, even if that parent has been consciously absent since she was an infant. I've encouraged Wild to try to have a relationship with her mother and I've never, ever stood in the way of that relationship. It was her mother who couldn't seem to get her shit together to develop a relationship with Wild. I can't even count how many birthdays and Christmases Wild got through broken-hearted because her mother couldn't remember to call or at least send a card. I don't know how many times I've had to sit and gently, lovingly explain to Wild that it's not HER fault that her mother doesn't want to have a relationship with her and that there is nothing wrong with Wild to make her mother dislike her. Those are never fun conversations to have with a sobbing kid. How many times did that woman call and make promises to a hopeful 8-year-old "I promise I'll write...I promise I'll call...I promise...I promise...I promise," and then not uphold a single promise? Can you even begin to imagine how that shatters a kid? The one person in the whole world who is supposed to love you and protect you more than anyone else can't even take five minutes to call and just say "Happy birthday."

Her mother's inability to be a mother has affected Wild in so many ways. The anger, the depression, the feelings of abandonment. How can a mother do that to her kid?

I didn't have a relationship with my father for years and now he's dead and I regret we didn't have a better relationship. I don't want Wild to ever regret not having, or at least trying to have, a relationship with her mother. I won't get in the way of that and I'll be here if she needs me.

So, while I won't stand in the way of Wild developing a relationship with her mother, I think I'm going to have to put my foot down when it comes to her cultivating some kind of friendship with my husband. Because you know what? She already tossed him aside once. She doesn't deserve anything beyond basic civility from him.

Discuss Wild, sure, she is their daughter, afterall, but he is NOT her sounding board nor is he her advice guru.

And to top it all off, she asked to talk to me a few days ago. As if somehow I want to be her friend now. She wanted to thank me for raising her daughter. THANK ME! It's a good thing my momma taught me that if I can't say something nice, not to say anything at all. And it's a good thing that advice stuck because I managed to keep my mouth shut. The words running through my head would have made a sailor blush.

Sister, sister

I'm sick and tired of breaking up fights between the 15-year-old and the six-year-old. You'd think with nearly 10 years between them they could at least act civil towards each other. My sister and I fought constantly, but we are only two years apart. We had reasons to fight, she annoyed me and I forced her to do things we weren't supposed to do so if we got caught, I wasn't the only one in trouble. Somehow though, it never worked out as planned. I was usually the only one who got in trouble. Think maybe my mom caught wind of my scheming? Naw.... And she was kind of a dork...I mean, color guard? Art geek? Sheesh.

Wild and Unruly fight like they have just two years between them. Unruly touches Wild's bedroom door and all hell breaks loose. It's not like they are borrowing clothes are stealing boyfriends or spreading rumors. Wild looks at Unruly wrong and a reverberating "MOM!!" echoes through the house and makes me want to hide under the nearest rock. Any rock. I'll take up residence with the roly polys and the worms. They probably get along at least.

Very rarely are my daughters ever actually nice to each other, which drives me crazy. Why can't they just be nice? They are always poking and picking, touching and evoking, anything to get a rise out of the other one. They know which buttons turn on crazy, and they push them...incessantly. Just be nice. For once it would be so satisfying to hear them use nice words to each other and not come tattling to me over every little "crime" committed by the other. I hear myself saying "Would you two just. be. nice. to each other? Please?" more than any other phrase. Well, except for the "Momma needs another margarita," phrase. That one is most likely uttered most often.

I guess I always had visions of Wild standing up for Unruly and being a role model for her little sister. I imagined them playing board games together and Wild helping Unruly paint her nails or decorate her room and Unruly going to her big sister for help to solve boy problems or advice on clothes and make-up.

Instead, I got girls who pick at each other like sticky boogers and a 6-year-old who knows the words to "Girlfriend," and "Stupid Girls."

Oh, and they both can roll their eyes and sigh with great annoyance at a level of expertise not seen since Molly Ringwald graced the big screen in "Sixteen Candles" and "The Breakfast Club."

Maybe things will get better. A mom can only hope, eh?

After all, I actually like my sister now. In fact, I would have to say she's one of my best friends, she's that cool. Truly.

Odds and ends

It's bad enough my favorite television shows are interrupted by commercials. Now, my cell phone is being inundated by text messages. So, now not only do I get to view unwanted ads, I get to pay for them, too! When did it become an okay practice for companies to text me ads? Any idea how I can make them stop? It's not like there's a national "Do Not Text" list I can sign up for.

The weather is tolerable again so I've been able to finally get to some of the chores I've been putting off because I didn't really feel like dying of heat stroke. I FINALLY got the nest boxes up in Chateau de Plume and my feathered friends are actually using them! Yes, we have eggs! Many, many eggs. Dark brown ones, light brown ones, greenish ones, speckled ones, big ones, little ones. Pretty soon we'll have light blue ones and at least one white one every day. I'm picturing a whole lot of omelets and scambled eggs and French toast in our future, and I don't even LIKE eggs. But I like my chickens, so it's a fair trade.

I've washed my truck twice in the two weeks I've had it. Once because we picked up a load of hay and the bed got DIRTY and another time because it looked a tad bit grungy! It's a sickness. I'm wanting to buy soft chamois cloths and some wax so I can rub it's body to a high sheen. I even bought a little thing of Armor-All wipes to keep in the truck, just in case. I think I washed my Cavalier a grand total of four times in the nearly eight years I had it.

What is it about days off that inspire me to do mega-deep cleaning in the house? Could it be the complete lack of children in the house? Could it be that I can crank up the music and get lost in the cleaning part without worrying about not being able to hear the "MOM!" screeching from another room? I don't know what it is, but now, my house is CLEAN CLEAN CLEAN! And it took me ALL day to get it there. I give the girls two days to return it to its usual state of not-quite-spotless. I even steam cleaned the carpets and sanitized the ceiling fans. Yet another sickness I must contend with.

Wild seems to be buckling down so far and doing her school work. So far. We are only a week and a half into the school year, so, much remains to be seen.

Unruly is doing very well with a male teacher. So far, no "bad behavior" reports. Either she's behaving OR he hasn't deemed the behavior bad enough to warrant a "mom call" yet. Still, only a week and a half into the school year. All hell can still break loose.

Ready? Set? DRIVE!

Wild is 15. She is taking the first installment of her first driver's ed class this semester. Thankfully, it's only book learnin'. I probably echo a lot of parents when I say "But, she's not mature enough to be behind the wheel of a 2,000 pound killing machine! She's still a KID!"

She really ISN'T mature enough. Not yet. Maybe in another year. But right now, the thought of her behind the wheel is terrifying. She reacts very badly when she has to make a decision on the fly. She becomes a hand-wringing, indecisive flake. How long will it take her to realize she has to move over when that semi is barreling down the road at her? Or that slowing down for that sharp curve before you get to it is probably a good idea? Will she figure it out soon enough or will we be getting a call from the state police to come down and identify her body? Yeah, don't want to think about that.

We've already laid out the rules for driving. She knows that just because she turns 16 it doesn't mean she automatically gets to take a trip down to the department of motor vehicles and walk out with a license. She knows it, but I don't think she believes it quite yet. And I know she doesn't believe me when I remind her I don't HAVE to allow her to get a drivers' license at 16. Or at 17. At 18, it's all on her. But before then, we are still the parents and she is still the minor.

I am a firm believer in the Good Student Discount for car insurance. So, guess what? Want to drive? Get the grades up and keep them up. I don't really think that's asking too much. Driving is a privilege, not a right.

Oh, I know how very important driving is to teens. I remember waiting very, very impatiently to hit the big 1-6 and be able to drive officially. It meant freedom! It meant I could go places without my parents! It also meant I had to bring good grades home and not act like an idiot.

Needless to say...I didn't have the "not act like an idiot" part down very well, so, I didn't get to drive very often. In fact, pretty much NEVER. Not alone anyway.

And that made me mad. So I acted like an idiot even more.

I once stole my mom's Jeep Grand Wagoneer while she and my stepdad were out of town and forced my sister to go with me for a joy ride. Because if I got caught, we were BOTH going down. It took FOREVER to find the spare keys, but find them I did!

I only admit this now because my mom lives on the other side of the U.S. and can't give me the terrifying "Mom Look." hehe!

And because I know now what my mom was feeling at the time I turned 16 and officially became old enough to join the driving masses. It's quite terrifying.

What if I just homeschooled?

Why is it I always feel like I need a vacation from my vacation? I could barely haul myself out of bed Monday morning, but I really wasn't getting up that much earlier than during vacation. I dragged butt ALL DAY LONG at the office, and accomplished umm...exactly NOTHING.

And it's not like we did anything terribly strenuous while I was home last week, unless, of course, you count getting into and out of a swimming suit every day as strenuous. Oh, and I did some laundry. But that was it.

I did manage to get to the gym yesterday, so that was a move in the right direction. Now, if I can just keep up with it, things will be wonderful!

The girls started school yesterday. They barely had half a day and will have early dismissal for the rest of the week. What the heck? Why? When school starts it should actually start, right? Not just choke to life over the course of a week. Kids are resilient and can hit the ground running, they don't need to be babied and eased back into the school routine. Absolutely ridiculous.

Unruly has a male teacher this year, which she is extremely excited about. I didn't get my first male teacher until 7th grade, so seeing a man who WANTS to be in a room full of first-graders is kind of unusual. Or he's raving mad. But, he seems like he really loves being a teacher. And, how can you go wrong with a teacher who has "The Incredibles, "Spiderman" and "Superman" posters on his walls? I don't think you can. And maybe Unruly will see a man more of an authority figure rather than someone she can just walk all over and disregard entirely.

Wild got a rude awakening about high school. She failed a few classes last year and managed to finish the year out with a less than 2.5 GPA. School policy says that if you have less than a 2.5 GPA you must take a study hall. The counselor's exact words were "If you couldn't handle seven hours last year, we definitely don't think you can handle it this year." Hmmm...I think he may have something there.

This leaves her in a situation where she is now three classes behind her requirements needed for graduation, and another two classes automatically negated because of the study hall requirement. She understands now that because she screwed around last year she will NOT be graduating with the rest of her class. The counselor made that very clear to her. The school does not offer summer school make-up classes. The community college, however, does. But I'm not paying $300-$400 for her to take a class she failed in the first place. She is old enough to face up to the consequences for her choices, and the failing grades was a CHOICE. She's not dumb. She's just not motivated and how the heck do you motivate a 15-year-old? Maybe the prospect of not graduating will motivate her ass into getting decent grades this semester, because if she does, she may have the chance to drop the study hall next semester and take a required class instead. And that may help her get caught up.

We'll see what happens.

Lucky me! I have one kid who doesn't play well with others but is a perfectionist who expects only the best from herself and is absolutely brilliant, and another who is an overactive socialite with tendencies towards depression and enough smarts to get the job done well but just doesn't care. This is going to be an exciting school year!

Maybe I should hang up my journalist's hat and homeschool the girls?

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! I crack myself up.

Swamp mouth

Anybody have any idea what it costs to put the tin grin in your daughter's crooked-as-a-picket-fence mouth?

Let me share: About $2,500. That doesn't include the bi-monthly visits to make sure everything is just hunky dory. Add that cost to approximately three years of listening to Wild complain about the metal in her mouth and how much she hates it and you'd think the resulting straight, beautiful smile would be worth it all in the end, right?

Well...right. Kind of. Her smile is gorgeous. Beautiful straight teeth that make a momma proud and should make her want to flash that grin at everyone.

Except she absolutely refuses to remember to brush them. And she refuses to remember to wear her retainer. So, those $2,500+ teeth are now becoming crooked again and they have an attractive fuzzy yellow hue adorning their should-be-pearly surface. Talking close to her smells a whole lot like my Dumpster on a hot summer day. There was one incident during the brace face days when she managed to get a whole peanut stuck beneath the metal gridwork in her mouth. And it remained there for nearly two weeks because she was too lazy to get a toothpick. The stink was incredible. I thought something had died in there.

How in the hell am I supposed to convince a 15-year-old how very important oral hygiene is? Huh? How? I can't hold her down and brush her teeth for her, like I do with Unruly. I can't force her to wear the retainer every night, because she'll just end up taking it out despite my most noble efforts. I don't even know if the darn thing fits any more because it's been so long since she's worn it and her teeth are no longer nice and straight.

This is so very, extremely frustrating. I feel like I'm talking and she's just nodding to keep me happy. I'm thinking just tossing that money into the fireplace last winter probably would have been more productive.

Any suggestions to convince a teenager (who knows it all, just in case you were wondering) to brush her own freaking teeth? Public humiliation doesn't work, I've tried and she just throws the famous eye roll in my direction. I've tried telling her no boy is going to want to get ANYWHERE near her toxic mouth and she doesn't seem to mind so much. Begging doesn't work and I feel like a fool doing it any way. Daily reminders don't work because as soon as the words come out of my mouth, she's already forgotten.

I'd hate to see those teeth just rot and fall out, but I guess at least they'd fall out in a nice, straight line. *sigh* Oh, what's a mom to do?

Floral bliss

For the first time since I put my first flower seed in the ground I have poppies. Beautiful, big, bright red California poppies. I LOVE poppies! I've never had luck with them in the past despite planting the damn things every. freaking. year.

I pointed them out to everyone and even made them go out to the garden and look at their exquisiteness up close and personel. I love their papery skin and their black centers. I love they way they move in the breeze. I think about the Wizard of Oz and that field of poppies the Wicked Witch of the West creates to stop the little party of adventurers "poppies...poppies...poppies."

Wild didn't understand my enthusiasm over a "stupid flower."

"Well, now we can make opium," I explained, smiling conspiratorially.

"What's opium?" from the 15-year-old.

I can't decide whether her ignorance of this narcotic is a good thing...or if I need to have another little "drugs are bad" conversation with her. She knows about pot and heroin and cocaine and LSD...but opium isn't in her vocabulary.

Note: I'm kidding about the opium, of course. We don't have enough poppies!

Punches thrown, summer break begins

I really don't know what to do any more. I sat at work and just cried because I don't know what to do and I'm completely out of ideas. Ever feel like you are a complete failure and there is no possible way to fix things? Yeah, that's how I'm feeling. There are some people who aren't cut out to be moms and I'm thinking I may be one of those people.

Unruly got kicked out of school...on the last day of school...for getting into fight after fight after fight. All before 10 a.m. today. And from what I understand she was kicking and hitting and punching other kids HARD because they were "bothering her."

She hit hard enough for her teacher to worry about the safety and welfare of the other kids. Hard enough to get sent to the principal's office long before lunchtime. Enough for the principal to call me and say "Come pick up your daughter, she can't be here any more, she is too violent with the other children."

What if they don't let her come back to school this fall? What if she can't behave during summer camp and gets kicked out of summer camp? I don't have many options aside from quitting my job. And I can't do that.

I really, really don't know where to go next. She has been seeing a counselor at school and obviously that hasn't done a bit of good. I've tried to find a counselor for her outside of school, but, surprise surprise, the ones that see kids her age are FULL and not taking new patients.

I can't think of anything at home that would encourage this behavior, this violence in her. Hubby and I don't fight, we don't yell at each other and we don't allow her to watch violent movies or cartoons. I even cut off the Spongebob Squarepants watching because I thought it was too violent for her. I'm thinking TV may have to be entirely banned for awhile.

She doesn't get spanked and she doesn't see anyone else in our house spanked or hit or smacked or kicked or punched. No one is allowed to wrestle around at all in the house any more after the last incident with Wild.

However, she is picked on and yelled at relentlessly by her sister and I can't help but think she is turning around and taking that anger at her sister and aiming it at someone else. I can't even begin to count the number of times I've admonished Wild to not be so mean and ugly to Unruly, to just be nice for once, just be nice. But it doesn't help, sometimes it even makes things worse. Wild wakes up in the morning yelling at her sister and spends pretty much the entire time she is home being mean and hateful towards her. And what do you do about that? What? I don't know. Wild is 15, Unruly is 6...how the hell do you force the two of them to just fucking get along? Or at least get Wild to act like she's 15 instead of 5.

I'm seriously rethinking my no-spanking policy. It's not working and something has to give and it has to give NOW. This can't keep going on, she can't keep thinking she can do whatever the hell she wants to do without serious and remembered consequences. Is she punished? Yup, with time-outs, the loss of privileges and extra chores. And I can tell you...it doesn't work. I don't know what kind of kids other people have where time-outs actually work, but I'll trade with you. Please. Take her. I'll pay you.

I'm so tired. I don't want to be a mom any more. Seriously. I don't. How can you be a good mom if there are times when you don't even really like your kids all that much, much less love them?

Ewww...ewww...ewww

Last night we took the cover off the pool.

What lurked beneath was quite, ummm...natural. Dark green water, an abundance of algae, some other stuff growing all happily and care-free in the non-chlorinated cement pond.

When we pulled that cover off and I saw the amount of work it will take to get that water back to a nice, sparkly blue, I sighed and wished for a beer. Or two. Or three. I looked at my darling husband and suggested we just buy a load of koi and introduce the ducks to their brand new home. Toss in a few water plants, maybe add some rocks so the koi have hiding spots, and instead of a swimming pool, we can have the world's most expensive and deepest backyard koi pond!

He didn't like that idea. Ugh. Scrub the algae, skim the crud.

Toss Unruly into the shallow end because she kept daring me to.
*gasp* Did I just admit that in my outside voice? Ooops!

Add the shock and ph-balancer and run the filter.

Yup. As we suspected, the filter is crap. Crap crap crap. We will be getting a new filter in the next couple of weeks, thank goodness. I just wanted to get it started so maybe it will be swimmable by Memorial Day. It won't be sparkly blue while we use the current piece of crap filter, but it may be less like a swamp and more like a lake in a couple of days.

And while I'll swim in a lake, my body ain't gettin' anywhere NEAR a swamp!