loose screws are the least of my problems...

The dreaded call home from school. It always makes me panic because it never means something good.

"Mom, my glasses broke," my daughter informed me. "Okay, that's not too bad." I asked her where her contacts were and she told me which bathroom and which cupboard they were in. I was fairly confident I could drop them off without too much problem.

I got to the school office and told the secretary that I needed to drop off my daughter's contacts. She waited for me to give them to her. "That would be easier, but you'll have to call her to come to the office," I told the secretary. She decided rather than try to figure me out, she'd just have Anna come to the office.

Anna arrived and I handed her a sack full of contact cases. Yes there were contacts in the bathroom. In fact there were several of them, all containing contacts. Apparently my children didn't realize that disposable contacts meant that when you were finished wearing them, you threw them away. She dug through the bag. "Nope, none of these are mine," she had the nerve to tell me, handing the bag back to me.

I had gotten every last contact, so there was nothing else I could do---and I knew Anna was blind without her glasses. "Let me see your glasses," I told her in frustration. "These aren't broken!" I exclaimed trying to see what the problem was. "The screw is gone," she pointed to the loose arm. That was nothing a little tape couldn't fix. A couple of minutes later she was all set to go back to class. I could pick up a screw later.

"It turns out I just have a screw loose," I told the secretary as I turned to leave, taking the bag of contacts with me. They would come in handy later that night at dinner when I asked the kids if any of them could define "disposable" for me...

Am I interrupting something?

Arriving at the Goodwill drop off, loaded to the hilt (with everything for the boy scout yard sale, they had cancelled for the last time) I went to the side door like the sign instructed. Going inside, I asked if this was where I could drop off my stuff. The man said he was busy (he was reading---maybe it was his break time), but a lady groaned, got off her chair and followed me back outside.

She held the door for me and took the first bag of stuff then disappeared inside for about five minutes. I was about to go inside to look for her when she finally reappeared. "Oh, you have more stuff?" she asked. With my trunk open she couldn't have helped but notice all the stuff piled into the back of my car.

I handed her another bag and again she disappeared inside. Guessing she must have been sorting and pricing each individual item as I waited, I began to get impatient. It had been two bags and ten minutes, and I still had about twenty bags left. I started piling bags by the side of the building when the helpful lady returned. "Oh, there's still more," she commented with a sigh. A man appeared telling me that I couldn't stack anything outside because if it got wet, they would just have to throw it away, then went back inside to sit down. Thanks.

Finally, I had to leave to pick up my kids from school. I had successfully handed the lady at the door two more bags but things were not looking good. No longer caring, I tossed bags from my car over towards the building. The man reappeared to tell me yet again that I couldn't do that. It was enough.

"Actually, I don't care if they get thrown away, or you sell them," I told him as friendly as I could while throwing bags from my car. He must have believed me because he returned with several friends from inside the building and within minutes my whole car was unloaded. Amazing, they had been in there the whole time, so sorry to disturb them.

I smell Oranges!

It was almost noon and my husband was coming home for lunch. I look forward to the quiet time we get during the day without kids. I eyed the oranges on the counter (a gift from Brian's dad when we visited last weekend) and felt guilty as I peeled a couple to eat with our lunch. We haven't eaten oranges at our house for years. Not that Brian and I don't like oranges---we actually enjoy them. Our daughter Anna, however, has issues with how they smell.

It started out mild: she would leave the room when we ate them, then refuse to be at the kitchen table. Then occasionally she would come home in tears from school. Thinking something was horribly wrong I rushed to ask her what had happened. "The girl next to me ate oranges with her lunch." It spiraled downward after that.

We ate our oranges at lunch feeling giddy in our deceit---thinking we'd really gotten away with something big. When Anna came home from school that day, she crinkled up her nose and asked disgustedly, "Who's been eating oranges?" and stomped outside until things aired out a bit more.

It made me seriously wonder. When did I lose control, or did I ever have it... I always swore I would never let my kids make me rearrange my life for their whims and quirky behaviors. Yet I am fairly certain at one point we used to even drink orange juice---but it is becoming just a fading memory. I guess I decided it was just easier to do without than deal with the drama, but I have to draw the line somewhere. Oranges are one thing and seem innocent enough, but where will it end?

All Aboard the Crazy Train

Nicholas' band Yttrium played as part of the "Concert in the Park" performance last month. This is a short clip of each of the songs they played. My favorites were "Louie, Louie" where Nicholas sang lead with Alex. And also, "Crazy Train" where Nicholas traded his drum sticks for an electric bass guitar. Since he is usually hidden behind the drum set, it was fun to see him up front for a change, and he can ROCK! Thanks to the success of this concert, they were asked to play for several additional gigs in the coming months.

Would you like a piece of candy, little girl?

Two things we always tell our kids: don't go in the street and don't take can't candy from strangers.

We were at the homecoming parade yesterday to watch two of our kids in the marching band. All the kids ran into the street---sometimes just in front of the oncoming floats, to pick up candy thrown by strangers. Hummm.

Is it supposed to make me feel better?

It's "Safety in Our Schools" week. The kids came home and told me they had a "Code Orange" drill during class that day.

Heather said after the code was announced, she immediately stood up, gathered her things and proceeded to the door. "What are you doing?" her teacher demanded. "Code Orange, Bomb threat, I'm evacuating," she informed him. "Oh."

Do I think it odd that Heather was the only one in her class that knew what a "Code Orange" was? No. She saw the list of codes a few years ago sitting on a teacher's desk and memorized it. She likes to memorize things, so it doesn't surprise me at all. I do find it odd that none of the teachers know what to do when various codes are announced.

For example. Sarah's teacher locked the door and closed the blinds, as soon as "Code Orange" was called. Which would have been very helpful if it had been a real bomb threat. However, to his credit it was better than my son's teacher---she didn't even pause, but continued on teaching. Finally the school police officer had to come and make them leave the building

For some reason, Heather was once again one of a few students taken during the drill and sent to a special room. These students, if not noticed missing by their teachers, "perish" from the pretend disaster. Last year Heather "died" in a pretend fire when her teacher failed to report her missing. This year, however, her teacher did notice her missing. Most likely he was looking for her to find out when they were supposed to finish evacuating and return to their classroom.

I am not comforted by these drills. If these are improvements from previous years, in the case of a real disaster, my children will never make it out of the school alive---except Heather that is.

It's pumpkin time!