The posts that wouldn’t be OR ramblings for a Thursday morning

So many things I could have written about over the last month but I just wasn’t feeling it.

There have been adventures…

E and I went down to a cool, private botanic garden in Fallbrook a few weeks ago without the boys.  We’ve been trying to spend more time together without them.  It’s all about balance and learning how to be a couple again after being 2:5 for so long.

There were goats, lots of rustic crap, and some yummy food.

Side note: this was my first time on the 395 in Fallbrook since the accident and I think I handled it pretty dang well.  I don’t think I’ve put last year’s accident behind me but maybe I’m desensitizing a little.  Now if I could just stop seizing up every time I see a car roll in a movie.

Last Sunday I asked E if he was in the mood for a sandwich.  (AKA easy way to get him to go somewhere that he likely would not have wanted to go in the first place.)  My ulterior motive was a scrapbook store that had lost its lease and was having a close out sale.   Instead of reminding me that I have enough crap and that I had just been at the expo the day before – all he asked was if it was the store with the comfy chair.  Like I said, sandwiches get me pretty far.

Katella Deli for a shared sandwich – after 30 years we’re getting better at sharing one meal rather than bringing home a ton of leftovers.  (We’ve officially turned into that old married couple with one meal, two plates, and two glasses of water.)  It’s all about compromise and finding something we can both not just tolerate but enjoy.  The winner? A combo of pastrami AND corned beef that was taken apart so that we each got exactly what we wanted – his side with yellow mustard and mine with brown and both slathered in coleslaw.

I miss deli SO much!  It reminds me of my dad and it is IMPOSSIBLE to find anywhere near us.  We both commented on how the sandwiches at Katella seem to be shrinking.  I also noticed that the clientele was all our age and older.  Although they were packed, like always, I wonder if after we are gone, Katella will be as well.  My kids don’t get excited about deli the way we (still) do and I cannot imagine them driving an hour to get a sandwich.  I hope I’m wrong.

There was scrapbook… shopping…

I keep sitting down to craft and nothing comes out.  Kind of like my writing – over the last few weeks I’ve been dry.  I was hoping walking around the expo with Lisa would solve that.  All it did was enable me to buy more stuff.  When I went to put it away I realized between the expo and the store, I’ve managed to buy a bunch of duplicates.  I REALLY need to organize again and get some stuff done.  Crop signed up for Thanksgiving weekend so I have the incentive, now I just need the motivation.

I did play with alcohol inks a few weeks ago and made some cool tile coasters that are still sitting in the family room waiting to be sealed.  THREE WEEKS LATER!

I probably should get on that.  I was so excited about the tiles that I went out and bought 9 more bottles of ink and some more tiles so that we could have a family craft night – ummm yeah… not sure when exactly the planets will align for us all to be home together but it was a nice thought.  The newly purchased supplies are also sitting in the family room; a constant reminder that we all lead WAY too busy of lives.

There was also a trip to Sam’s Club the other night to get a ginormous cinnamon roll.  Went for the roll, spent over $200 on stuff – mighty expensive pastry.  It would have been cheaper to get us all Cinnabons!  FYI Cinnabons would have tasted better, too – ours looked NOTHING like the Delish article.

Or caramel apples… I’ve been craving one for at least a month but the one at Myrtle Creek was disappointing and I cannot justify $10 at Rocky Mountain.  E saw that they have 13 varieties of apples on sale at Sprouts this week and I suggested that he buy one of each kind and we have an apple taste-off.  I even offered to make caramel dip.  Nope, not a self-serving suggestion at all.  😉 We’ll see if he comes through when he goes shopping.  If so, there WILL be a DIY caramel apple bar in our future!

Aaron tagged along on a trip up to Idyllwild last week.  E needed to site supervise the placement of the chapel he designed at Camp Emerson and I went along so he didn’t have to drive up alone.  Not sure why Aa came with except that he thought he was getting breakfast which apparently is NOT the same thing as run through the drive through at Mc Donald’s – good to know.  After we were done at Emerson, Aa DEMANDED “real food” so we stopped in town.  We walked around for a little bit – how have we never walked around Idyllwild despite the hundreds of trips we have made up there???? Happened upon a store that sells HAND-DIPPED ICE CREAM BARS! I search FOREVER for ice cream bars and the one time I find one I am too stuffed from eating TWO breakfasts?!?!  Good thing I can guarantee that that will not be my last trip up there so at some point, there WILL be an ice cream bar in my future.  Damn you Costco for taking them off the cafe menu! Curses!

There was a bunch of random ass shit, too…

The other night I was getting into bed and Anthony asked me why I was going to sleep in my work clothes.  I was wearing Rudolph pajama pants.  Either I’m way overdressing for sleep or I need to step up my work clothes from leggings.  Probably the latter.  Probably not going to happen though.  #leggingsarepantstoo

I finally de-Halloweened the front porch.  Took that nasty spider web crap off the trees.  That shit is worse than tinsel.  They’re both like holiday herpes!  Aa is already talking about Christmas so I am sure it’s only a matter of days before one of those damn trees is setup in my house.

Speaking of Halloween, we went to Target last week and bought about $20 in candy.  When candy is marked down 50% off that’s a shitload of candy.  I brought one bag of Reese’s to the office with me because I live with damn locusts.  E may have a few bags of Skittles hidden.  The GIANT bag on the counter is at least half way down! Locusts I tell you! (In all honesty, it’s mostly Aaron.)

The Mystery Oreos are STILL sitting on the kitchen counter from almost a month ago.  We tried them and they were just SO tasty that more than 1/2 the package is still there almost a month later.  Since it doesn’t look like anyone is going to eat them, I might need to find something else to do with them – maybe scrape the filling out and use the cookies for a cheesecake crust? Other ideas?  Want to know what we thought of them?

That being said, I just saw that they have limited edition Hot Cocoa Oreos out now.  Yeah, THOSE will be in my cart, most definitely.

Monday night I finally was able to stand on one leg. WITHOUT FALLING OVER! We’re nearing the end of yoga class so apparently the damn optimists were right and persistence does indeed pay off. Who’d have thought?

Last week, I read Dan Brown’s new book Origin.  We saw Thor: Ragnarok.  We rewatched the original Kingsman movie in hopes of seeing the sequel which is pretty much not even playing anymore.  We still haven’t watched season 2 of Stranger Things – once again trying to find a time when we can all watch it together so that no one is an asshole and spoils it for anyone else.  Yeah, not sure when/how THAT will ever happen.  It’s been a no go for the new season of Orange is the New Black, too – every time I sit down to watch it some kid starts asking me questions about characters or plot lines or the criminal justice system – sheesh, just watch it from the beginning and stop yammering on so I can hear what they are saying!

One last thing, there may have also been donuts as big as our heads, too.

The last two months of the year are filled with madness.  I have an adventure day with the boys scheduled for tomorrow (Veteran’s Day observed). Band is winding down – only 2 more performances to go!  2nd Annual Thanksgiving with the Weiners. Our 18th familversary.  Feeding pomegranates to and riding camels – YES REALLY!  CHINA!!!! Hanukkah/Festivus/Christmas.  E’s last birthday starting with a 4.

Holy shit that’s a lot of stuff – and I’m sure it’s not a complete list!  Despite the mayhem and chaos, it will be filled with family, friends, laughter, adventures, and shenanigans.  Definitely shenanigans! Because of course they are MY assholes children…

Until later llamas…

We didn’t go to Utah

We didn’t go to Utah last weekend with the band.  Eric wasn’t feeling it.  Aaron was being kind of an ass.  It was a 12 hour trip to watch an 8-minute performance. Juli said “Fuck no”.  It just wasn’t going to happen.

I’m really glad the other moms went.

It was supposed to be a fun trip.  Senior year. Perform. Hang out with your friends. Visit Zion NP.  There was even a swim/rock climbing party planned!  He was REALLY looking forward to it.  Couldn’t stop talking about it.  What could possibly go wrong?

Aaron.  If he’s not the source of the drama – it seems he’s right in the middle of it.

He’s emotional and high spirited and strong-willed and opinionated and he has zero filter. Zero.

And he found the drama – or it found him – and with a few choice words the weekend quickly spiraled in a fiery descent. And two of the band/scout moms were there to keep the embers at bay and get him back to Cali without me having to make (yet another) rescue mission.

It’s never a good day when he calls screaming about so-and-so and what she said or did (or didn’t do that she was supposed to do but didn’t).  He didn’t want to hear that mean girls suck or life isn’t fair or suck it up and (try to) avoid the drama or really anything I had to say.  I mean how do you talk a kid down when you are 3 states away anyhow?

Angie called that night to say how upset he was.  She let him vent.  Shannon had the joy of listening to him over lunch on Sunday.

He was still pissed when he got home Sunday afternoon.  And he still hadn’t let it go Monday morning and then he reignited.  Great.  Thankful for the teacher that talked him down and refocused him.  Concentrate on what you love, not on petty people that bring you down.

So had we gone would it have been any different? I’ve mulled this over non-stop for the last 48 hours.  Kicked myself for not going – not being there to diffuse a volatile situation before it turned into this shitstorm of emotions.  This isn’t something new.  Every time this happens I live with the mommy guilt.  I wasn’t at Forrest Lawn when he demanded to come home early.  I wasn’t there during the Pacific Crest tour.  And I wasn’t in Utah either.

It probably wouldn’t have made any difference at all.  He still would have had his feelings hurt, he still would have had his meltdown, and as a bonus he likely would have DEMANDED to drive home with us instead of living outside his comfort zone and riding the bus with his team.  And in classic parenting fail caused by all-consuming guilt, I probably would have let him.  I also probably would have lost my temper.  Probably not probably.

Deep down I know that I can’t always be there to rescue him from himself.  I can only be there to pick up the pieces and hope it will be the last time.  It won’t be.  It’s Tuesday and he really didn’t want to go to band this morning.  But he went anyway.  And that’s progress.

This parenting a quasi-adult thing is way harder than we expected; he may be 18 on paper but he’s still just a kid.  My kid.

I’m trying to stay out of the problem and instead just keep encouraging him to be strong, be the best Aaron he can be, and stop letting the “mean girls” win.  Eric’s fighting that inner battle between jumping in and staying out, too.  Neither one of us wants to see him quit (yet again) and at some point, we may not have the choice but to intervene.

As always, I’m uber thankful for the tribe that bands together to help us raise these boys.  I’ve lost track of the number of people that have been there for them in times of need, both emotional and physical.  It proves that parenting (especially parenting Aaron) is more than a full-time job.  It truly takes a village and luckily, sometimes that village travels to provide him comfort on the road, too.  You rock. mamas!

Avocados – they’re so amazing we have a THREE DAY festival in their honor

Avocados. I’m fairly certain if you don’t like them you have to turn in your California card. Luckily, we don’t have that problem in our house.  No rain this week – matter of fact, we’re back up into triple digits… so when E suggested the Avocado Festival, it was another HELL YEAH moment. A) food fest, B) beach, C) FOOD FEST!

I didn’t realize it at the time he proposed the idea but E just wanted to eat from the world’s largest bowl of guacamole. Or swim in it like Juli and I did at the sprinkle pool. It wasn’t even on display! It could have been a Tupeprware container for all we knew.  Seriously? If you’re going to advertise the WORLD’S LARGEST BOWL OF GUACAMOLE, have it on display, people!  He settled for chips and guac instead which was yummy and plentiful.

It’s usually sweets that get me excited, especially since I’m not big on chips – so I opted for a cone of the avocado mango sorbet. Ice cream? No brainer. Good choice because it was seriously YUMMY!

My AWESOME new shirt from our Huy Fong day. Saw LOTS of people wearing sriracha shirts at the fest! Nothing but love for guac and cock (sauce).

Avocados have been in short supply lately (#thanksglobalwarming) so it was nice to see them guaced, spread, deep fried,  baked, frozen and of course as a photo-op.  The varieties were amazing and the ones as big as our hands, wow!  In the markets they basically have bumpy and smooth (yes, I know they have REAL names) and Lord knows we’ve never been able to grow an avocado tree – so seeing so many different kinds was awesome.

 

 

Looks kind of Veggie Tales-ish – half expected it to start playing the Hairbrush song.

We got about 8,500 steps in, learned a bunch about avocados, and E scored a case of chips. They’re quinoa chips, but still.  I even treated myself to this necklace, customized for (some of) my obsessions. I just need to find an awesome llama charm. Not bad for a Sunday.

Until next time Avo Fest – Stay Golden, California!

 

Road to.. Sadness

I’m not sure when Juli and I decided this as the unofficial name of Route 66 west of Victorville. One thing is certain, we’ve driven it more times than either of us ever wanted to. Together. Alone. With others.  Directions? Take 15 North, exit D (look for the sign for the prison), turn left and go past the ampm (if you need to pee or get a drink STOP HERE), drive until you get really sad or see the sign.

Thankful for xm radio. Music blasting. Often trying to tune out the 14 miles of desolate landscape, deserted and rundown buildings, grafitti covered trains, tumbleweed, odd businesses in the middle of nowhere, a federal prison, and the occasional non-vehicular traveler.

Yes, people walking, pushing strollers and grocery carts, golf carts, and my personal favorite, motorized scooter chairs. Where did they come from? And where the heck are they going? You’re on the road from nowhere to, NOWHERE! You probably should have brought a CAR, you’re in the DESERT, people!!!

Seriously, 14 miles of THIS! This is in danger of trespassing? REALLY? There’s NO DOOR!

So much sadness with a few interesting moments in between.

Like the Cross Eyed Cow pizza parlor. Never stopped for the pizza but the colorful roof cow and VW bus advertisement…

This “city” is the only sign of civilization. If you can call it that. The OFFICIAL roadsign for the post office reads “Oro Grande Post Office”. Why the quotation marks? Is it a ploy to capture wayward travelers? I wouldn’t be shocked.

The abandoned Mohawk gas station. When was the last time gas was $1.99/gallon? Especially on a deserted stretch of highway?

The station graphics are still pretty much intact despite being boarded up. The pumps, not so much.

And Bottle Tree Ranch. We’ve driven by SOOOO many times and never stopped at this roadside attraction. This time, thinking this was my last trip, I took a few minutes to walk through.

So how far do we travel The Road? Fourteen. Miles. Turn at “The Sign”.

Yes, the saddest sign on the saddest road is where we know to turn. We’ve never stayed at “The Inn”. I’m fairly certain horror movies were based on this.

Haven’t stayed here either. Obvious reasons.

After years of traveling 66 to Helendale, our trips are finally coming to an end. The house will be sold soon. Our link to the area officially broken. Goodbye Helendale. Not exactly sad to say farewell.