Category Archives: organization

Have You Heard About the Lonesome Loser?

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

Today was officially the first day of preschool for Kid E.  I have to say that it was kind of a letdown.  We didn’t make a big deal out of it last night.  We didn’t pick out a special first day of school outfit.  I almost forgot to take him in on time (and no, it was not because I was playing video games… smart asses) and I didn’t even stop to take his picture out front.  I already did that stuff three weeks ago when he went to camp.  He gave me a high-five then went into the room without so much as a glance in my direction.  So I just paid his tuition and went outside to my car.  It was then that I realized that I had my freedom back, at least for three and a half hours each Monday, Wednesday and Friday.  I got kind of tingly thinking about what I was going to do today.

As I was climbing into the driver’s seat I heard music pumping from the speakers outside of the pizzeria next door.

Sit down, take a look at yourself
Don’t you want to be somebody
Someday somebody’s gonna see inside
You have to face up, you can’t run and hide

Damn you, Little River Band.

I really do not like it when the universe smacks me on the head and demands that I pay attention.  But there was my message, coming at me on the voices of Australian rockers.  And I have learned that you either pay attention to these messages, or you’d better get ready for a fight that you will probably never, ever win.

So today I will make a plan.  Today I will set goals.  I will write them on paper and I will post them where I will see them every day.  And I will be productive and proud.

So actually I thank you, Little River Band.  And I think that’s Australian for “light a fire under your butt.”

For my easy-going friends

... and for my Type A peeps - Holla!

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

I’m Bored

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

Sheepdog and I are always entertaining the idea of moving.  The kitchen is too small, the garage is too small, and I can’t see who is pulling into the driveway because there are no windows on the south side of the house.  Problem is that the real estate market is still swimming around in the toilet, so we would lose money if we sold now.  Additionally, we like lots of things about this house… the general floor plan, the schools, the neighborhood, and the location.

So we continue the crazy dance and we change our decision just about every other month.  Remodel.  Move.  Remodel.  Move.  Definitely we should remodel.  Absolutely we’re going to move.  And so it goes…

You never know which one of us will get the bug to switch up the current plan.  The catalyst can be anything from a shift in the global political scene to an accidental stumbling upon House Hunters.  Last week the stock market was doing a really fine roller coaster impression.  Not much surprise when Sheepdog then called out “Remodel!”  So I drew up a wish list and some rough sketches and we met with our contractor.

What we want to do is a decent-sized project.  We want to blow out a wall to expand the kitchen.  That means taking real estate from the existing screened porch and enclosing that room to make it part of the house.  We might as well put in some mudroom cabinets and a bench and a side porch with a window while we’re fiddling around in there.  We also would like to take the existing deck (which is untapped real estate now because it is either too hot or covered with pollen) put a roof over it, add some walls of windows (that we can close occasionally to keep the pollen out) and make it a 3-season porch.  And back to the kitchen… there are some tweaks in functionality that I’d like to see occur in there, so let’s just gut it and start over.  Oh, and I’d like to re-do the master bath while we’re at it.

Yes… a “decent-sized” project.  We should just move.  Ugh.

This house is currently favorite on http://www.realtor.com right now

It has over 22,000 square feet of house and costs just under $7 million

Sheepdog just shakes his head at me.  What?  A girl can dream, can’t she?

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Time for Snack Monsters

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

First order of business…  how many of you were compelled to check my spelling of “prerogative” from yesterday’s post?  Apparently, I have been working on the false belief that it was spelled p-e-r-o-g-a-t-i-v-e for many, many years.  I looked it up in no less than five places and I still didn’t feel comfortable spelling it with an “r” up front.  I honestly thought it was some kind of universal joke, like when the idiot masses say, “lemme axe you a question” or “irregardless.”  But with both the ex- Mr. Whitney Houston and Britney Spears (who remade the song) spelling it the way of the former on iTunes, I finally decided to accept “prerogative” as gospel.

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I don’t want to jinx anything by saying so, but I think that we are all adjusting nicely to the new schedule.  By this time last year, Kid C had already been sent home sick from school and was battling a nasty virus, which I think went on to crush me and Kid E as well.  Kid D had decided he did not want to go to kindergarten and had thrown a tantrum to end all tantrums by the front office of the school (hello and nice to meet you, school principal!).  And Kids A and B were already crushed by an early onslaught of homework doled out by teachers who seemed to have some kind of anger management issues.  This year, even with Sheepdog traveling for work since Monday, we are chugging along nicely.

But don’t worry.  I am not getting all full of myself because this is just The Wiz version of the fall schedule (where we just Ease on Down the Road).  The real thing starts in a couple of weeks when we have to figure out how to drive to all of the sports and activities (practices and games), all of which are very likely to be scheduled on the same day.  And Sheepdog will continue to go out of town for his job (have you noticed the increase in food-borne illness outbreaks lately?  Holy E. coli-tainted cow!).

But I am not complaining.  Having a full schedule means that we have healthy kids who are active and involved and are getting exercise and all of the good things that come from being part of a team.  And my husband has a good, steady job.  And those are all very, very good things for which I give thanks every day.

In the interim, while we still have the time for it, I have decided to spoil the kids with their favorite after-school snacks.  They’re made with apples, grapes, raisins, peanut butter and Nutella.  I don’t think I have ever seen my kids get so excited over food as they do when I make these things.  The 50’s stay-at-home-mom/ housewife part of me gets gooey with pride.  But then probably I’ll snap back to regular me and make them eat cereal for dinner while I drink some wine.  We don’t need these kids getting spoiled or anything.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Wrangling the Entropy Tip #6, Happy Birthday Every Flipping Week!

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

It has been said that I have a fairly large family.  Actually it all depends on what circles we’re hanging in, as mine is nothing when I’m hanging with my Catholic, Mormon or Ethiopian peeps.  Five kids ain’t Jack to them and they call me names like “baby-making slacker” and laugh snidely that we can drive everyone around in one car that does not have the name “Blue Bird” soldered on the side.  But considering that the average American family still only has 1.86 children, we’re technically still above the curve.

Figure also that I have three sisters and Sheepdog has one.  Those sisters each have a spouse plus 3, 3, 3 and 2 kids each, respectively.  Add our parents, the siblings and their husbands, Sheepdog plus me and our five kids, and we are celebrating birthdays and important holidays and milestones for fourteen adults and sixteen kids each year.  It’s a lot to coordinate.  So much that it becomes a pain in the butt and I don’t always want to do it.  So I don’t do it all.

No, I do not pick my favorites and only send them presents (great idea, but it tends to lead to some family drama).  Nor do I universally ignore birthdays and skip Christmas (although some years I would like to).  We go in together on presents and we share the responsibility of buying the gifts.  It works for us.

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The Joint Birthday Gift(s)

On my side of the family we have all agreed that $25 per family is a fair amount to spend on kids’ birthday presents, especially when there are so many of them (kids, not presents).  Now, $25 is not really a lot of money anymore when you take it to a Target or Toys R Us or http://www.amazon.com.  So we decided that we would pool our money and get $75 worth of gifts (one big, several small… whatever works based upon the kid’s wish list).  That way, too, only one person has to do the shopping and wrapping and card making.  The gifts are very personal (not just a gift card) and it doesn’t feel like so much of an obligation or a chore because you are not doing it every few weeks (which is seriously how often gift-worthy occasions come up around here).

This was the signature page for my niece's 2nd birthday card. And it doesn't even include her mom and dad or her siblings.

The UoweME List

My sisters and I keep a running list because we are always rotating who does the shopping.  This also comes in handy for bridal and baby showers, graduations and flower deliveries.  We agree upon a dollar amount, pool our money and buy something a little bigger than we would be able to buy if we each bought gifts separately.  We give the responsibility of maintaining the list to one person and settle up quarterly.  If the buying/ spending is done equally then we rarely have much to settle up.

The Christmas Pollyanna/Secret Santa gift exchange

At Christmas we assign a cousin to each kid (Kid A gets Cousin 7, Cousin 7 gets Kid E, and so on until all of the cousins are giving to and receiving from somebody).  We give those Christmas presents a $30 limit, with some flexibility.  So instead of buying a dollar store piece of junk, or overshooting your Christmas budget every year, we buy nice gifts that the receivers actually want.  Everybody gets fewer gifts overall, but it’s quality over quantity.  Win/ win.

For the siblings and our spouses, we set up a similar gift exchange but we do couples gifts that have a $100 limit.  Sister B and spouse buys for Sister D and spouse, Sister D and spouse buy for another sister and spouse, etc.  We each submit wish lists or ideas so that everybody is also getting something that they want.

For our parents, we get ideas from them and then go in on the gifts together.  This cuts down on returns, limits everybody’s overall shopping and because all of the presents are from everybody, it ensures that there are no favorites (my gift was nicer/ more expensive/ more personal than your gift, so of course mom loves me more).

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Now, a few things need to happen for these systems to work.  My group happens to be my immediate family, but any group with similar buying interests would work just as well.  Maybe you have a circle of friends and you all buy birthday and other holiday presents for each other and/ or each other’s kids every year.  You also need to have similar budgets.  And there can’t be any slackers in the group either.  Everybody has to step up to shop for, pay for, wrap and deliver some presents in order for it to work.

So go find your own group and give yourself a break every once in a while.  It’ll be your own little present.  So, you’re welcome.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Don’t Be Tardy for My Party

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

…and the parade of sisters continues as well.  Somehow I have managed to inspire (read: subtly threaten) all three of my sisters to contribute their wisdom nuggets to my blog.  Whatever their motivation, it makes me very happy because each of them has a very different style of parenting and I think they are pretty good at what they do best.

Sister B and I are the closest in age.  She was the one who invaded my pink princess canopy bed when she was less than two years old (I was a much more mature five-and-three-quarters) when Sister C came along.  So sue me that I may or may not have deliberately pushed her out of bed every night so our mom thought she wasn’t ready for a big girl bed and she needed to go back into a crib.  What some call “mean” others may describe as “mad genius.”  It’s all in the point of view, folks.

Sister B was the one who was such a baby when our parents went out of town and left our grandmother, Kettle, in charge (whom I so easily encouraged to go back to her own house for the night…”We’re fine!  Go and sleep in your own bed.  You can come back in the morning after you have your Sanka and a good poop.”), that she cried all night during the massive party I threw because she was scared for all of the teenagers who were getting their drunk on downstairs.  I also made her cry every time I queried, “You’re not wearing that, are you?” as she was about to get on the public school bus and I was walking out the door in plaid polyester to my uniform-required high school.  And I think she cried again when we had a fight with pots and pans that scared Sisters C and D into running away to the playground at the end of our street where a little boy asked them if they had gotten their periods yet.  Wait.  Did we grow up in the ghetto?

Anyway, Sister B and I have history.  Real sister history.  I never had to babysit her.  I was never old enough to change her diaper.  We are four years apart in age so we were never really in school together, but we were together all the time otherwise.  And together we survived the crazy that was pretty standard growing up with our family.

I have since apologized on multiple occasions for being mean (or a mad genius) and making her cry all the time.  And despite having a semi-tortured childhood, Sister B has grown up to become one of the women I most admire in this busted up world.  She completed college in three years, had a big-time career, lived in the city, married an incredibly charming and colorful metrosexual and together they have three great kids (an Aspie followed by two neurotypicals).  After settling in suburbia, Sister B was not content to simply rest on the tailgate-ready 3rd row seat of her minivan.  No!  She dove headfirst into the complicated world of extensive therapies for her son with Asperger’s Syndrome, and by working with the best that Atlanta has to offer they made it possible for him to mainstream by the time he was old enough for kindergarten.  And for the past few years she has been el presidente of her kids’ elementary school foundation, where she has led her team to raise over $90,000 for capital improvements for their school (www.MBEFoundation.net).  Yes, she’s that awesome.  And a little bit nuts.

And now I proudly present her post to you…

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Don’t Be Tardy for My Party by honorary guest writer, Sister B

Sister A inherited our Mom’s beauty.  Sister C inherited our mother’s cooking prowess.  Sister D, hands down, got Mom’s empathy.  And I got our mother’s profile (well, really just her nose) and her intense passion for throwing a good party.  My 3 sisters are what you might call xenophobes, or homebodies – happy most often to stay at home versus going out on the town.  But Mom and I are kindred spirits in the social sense.

Mom owned a very successful catering company for 12 years.  I have fond memories of growing up on Chelsea Road surrounded by lots of Mom’s friends/employees who descended upon our kitchen like ants to the anthill each week to cut, chop, dice and slice in preparation for the upcoming weddings, bar mitzvahs and anniversary parties.  I was, and still am, so fascinated by her ability to come up with a party idea and pull it off under budget and exceed her clients’/guests’ expectations.

Our mother always makes a big deal out of birthdays.  Growing up in a big family, I realize it wasn’t easy for our parents to always “do it up,” but Mom always did.  She taught me at a young age that with a great theme and a small budget, you could have a party that no one would ever forget.  And that the secret to a fabulous party was always in the details.

When my husband and I were first engaged, we decided to start a gourmet club where friends rotated homes and hosted a themed dinner party once a month.  Our most memorable was our French-themed soiree, complete with a red, white and blue fabric tablescape and a mean coq au vin (did I mention my hubby is an amazing cook?), ¾ liter of vodka, 8 bottles of wine and lots of beer (for only 6 adults)…the cops showed up because we were being too rowdy with our late-night karaoke.  I was excited because I had earned some validation that we still had “it.”  We also started our tradition of a yearly Christmas Open House and quickly learned that hiring a bartender was a necessity in order to actually enjoy conversations with our guests.

Fast forward several years and three kids later and the daunting task of planning our children’s birthday parties surfaced.  Mom didn’t even have to specify that paying a bouncy house or carting the neighbors’ kids to Chuck E. Cheese were not viable options.  Thus began my quest to plan some excellent parties for my kids with great themes and on the cheap.

The year our oldest son turned 4, he excitedly announced to our family that in honor of his upcoming birthday, he would like an airplane party and I gladly accepted the challenge.  I purchased world puzzles, inflatable globe beach balls and packets of cloud-themed tissues for the goody bags.  We decided we needed some entertainment and hired a girl who did face painting and balloon animals.  We made her dress in a navy suit and airline hat and made her a “Pilot Katie” name badge.  When she showed up at our door in a tight skirt and a low-cut blouse with a boom box, all of the dads in attendance sat up a little straighter hoping to get noticed and our next-door neighbor went home to get a few singles.

Super powers include being able to wear this costume after having kids

Our middle son was obsessed with superheroes (like most 5-year-old boys), so we planned a dress-up party with lots of photo ops, complete with our neighbor in a Spiderman suit, Sister C as Wonder Woman, and sister D as Catwoman.  And once again the neighborhood dads were happy with a cooler of beer and some eye candy.  I see a recurring theme here…We started a great and inexpensive tradition of creating a CD as a party favor with songs related to the theme of the party.  The parents, as well as the kids, were excited to hear “Wonder Woman,” the “Theme from Superman,” and “Spiderman,” classics every kid should know and love.

One of our favorite kid parties was our oldest son’s racecar birthday.  Thank goodness the weather was supposed to be beautiful.  My husband reluctantly agreed to my latest crazy creative idea of spray painting individual cardboard boxes and letting the kids and affix stickers/decals and black paper plate “wheels” on their cards upon arrival.  We drilled holes on the tops of the finished boxes and used rope as suspenders so the kids could wear their cars at the party.  When everyone finished pimping their rides, we handed out racecar driver helmets and the kids ran around the neighborhood, checkered flag at the finish line and all.  On the food tables, I used black plastic tablecloths and masking tape to create a roadway with dotted lines, tossed on a few matchbox cars and…voila!…instant table décor and entertainment for the kids while they waited for their food.

For our daughter’s third birthday, she chose a rainbow theme and I talked my husband into creating a balloon arch rainbow in our living room out of PVC pipe.  The look on her face made it all worthwhile.  She couldn’t believe we actually had a rainbow in our house!  We had a dance party to “Over the Rainbow” and other color-themed songs and made rainbow necklaces.  We just threw a magic party for our 8-year-old and all of the kids learned tricks and put on a show at the end of the party.

Several times a year, we host a movie night on our lawn.  It’s an easy party to host because we are not entertaining inside.  Everyone brings food and drinks to share, lawn chairs, blankets and bug spray and our kids and friends love it!  Together we are making memories for our children which they will look back on fondly.  So I challenge you to use a little imagination and creativity and you’ll be surprised at how little it takes to throw a party your family and friends will talk about for years to come… and you just might have fun doing it!

I Suck at Coupons

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

Coupons drive me crazy.  I love them because they are FREE MONEY!  They are the bane of my existence because I feel like I am burning the free money if I don’t use them.  One in particular has been weighing on me for weeks now.  It was for twenty dollars off of a two hundred-dollar order at my regular grocery store.

Now, with seven people in our house you would think that I could rack up a two hundred-dollar order without even trying.  Sure thing, especially if I build some storage shelves and stockpile, Extreme Couponer-style.  But I don’t buy stuff I don’t need.  And I don’t buy things just because they are on sale.  Plus, I have been trying to be extra frugal in my shopping when I can because – I don’t know if you’ve heard – there is a recession going on, and a third driver/ third car/ third gas tank and insurance costs are less than a year away for us, and college tuition is only three years away, and Good Lord these kids always seem to need new shoes.

… but back to my $20 off $200 coupon.  I didn’t use it.  Sob.

When it first came in the mail we were just about to leave on an extended trip.  So we were trying to eat the things that were already in the house and clear out the pantry.  “Waste not, want not” and such.  That trip ended up being almost a month.  When we returned I was planning to go to the grocery store for a big stock-up trip, but I was pouty because I wasn’t living at the beach anymore so I kept putting it off.  And we kept eating stale oyster crackers and almost expired soup.  And it was so flipping hot outside that I was not inspired to do anything.

Eventually I could not serve/ eat another packet of oatmeal or bag of frozen vegetables, so I went to the store.  There are two of the exact same chain grocery stores near my house.  They are about the same distance away in opposite directions.  One is really fancy and one is, um… not so much.  I always go to the Not So Much one because it is rarely crowded and they have basically the same things, so what if they get the hand-me-down rusty carts.  They know me and let me do my thing at the Not So Much (like bagging my own groceries – which is a form of packing, so I’m really good at it – it drives me insane when the idiots crush my groceries).  At the Fancy one they have kids with “Bagger” on their name tags (imprinted, not just written in Sharpie!), so you’d better not try filling your own bags at that one.

You just know that boy doesn't put the milk on top of the bread. You Go, Danny!

For some reason I chose to go to the Fancy store on this trip (probably delusion from all of the heat, but whatever).  They seem to have more of a produce selection and I was in the market for lots of fresh stuff.  I filled my cart with meat and chicken and fruits and vegetables and bread and eggs and cheese and milk and yogurt.  Wheat bread, cake mix, Coca-Cola, shaving cream (Sorry, that last stuff wasn’t on my real list – it was from a commercial from when I was a kid and I will never be able to recite a grocery list without adding them at the end for the rest of my life.  Excellent marketing job because I can still recite it when I often can’t even remember my own kids’ names – my guess is that it was an ad for Coke.  It’s a shame that stuff is poison and I just won’t buy it.).

So I go up to the checkout with a full cart and my Very Special Customer coupon.  Until that moment I had forgotten that they are so fast to check you out at Fancy – someone was even pulling stuff out of my cart and putting it on the belt while the checkout girl was scanning at lightning speed and the Bagging Team (seriously, there were TWO kids bagging my groceries!) was like Matrix-fast.  I was blown away so much that they disoriented me.  I was even a little dizzy when the cashier gave me my total and it was… $192.  Wait!  Nooooooooooooooooooo!  I can’t use my coupon unless the total is at least two hundred dollars.

I should have picked up another ginormous pack of toilet paper or some more lunchmeat.  I should have gotten more cereal.  Maybe I could just go grab something else right now.  But, no!  The Fancy store will not tolerate hold-ups in their lines.  They move you right along, almost forcefully so.  And there were at least three people in line behind me.  I guess I could have been, but I didn’t want to be “That Shopper.”  So I paid the bill and I left.  With my coupon still in hand.  Sigh.

I was kicking myself as I loaded the groceries into my car.  I continued all the way home.  And it has been on my mind ever since.

I should have planned better.  I should have bought one more this or a couple more of that.  If only they counted big bottles of wine towards the total.

That coupon has since expired.  I mourned it much more than I should have.  Because soon another one will come in the mail and I will start the whole process over again.  Damn coupons.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Tales from the Trip – Part Two

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep. - Robert Frost (this many miles, to be exact)

Three a.m. announced itself with a crappy song on the alarm clock radio.  I did not get nearly enough sleep and I had none of the “I’m going on a family trip today!” excitement that fueled me through the drive there.  But Sister B was due to arrive that afternoon with her three kids in tow and we would be even more hard up for decent sleeping arrangements if we stayed.  So I reluctantly got out of bed, made myself some coffee, and woke up some kids (best part of the day so far… just a small payback for all of the times they have done it to me).  Kid E woke up crying.  I don’t know if he was still going from the night before or if he was starting fresh, but he was working up a mighty fine fit.  What do I do about that?  Let’s all strap ourselves in to a confined space for about fourteen hours.  But first I shall spill about half of my freshly brewed coffee on my seat.  Awesome.

What is nice about the trip in this direction is that we are on the highways pretty quickly, so the kids would be melodically lulled back to sleep.  What is decidedly not nice are the number of toll booths on those same highways that are preceded by those things in the road that sound like machine gun fire when you drive over them so that if you are by chance sleeping while driving, you will indeed wake up just before you pull up to/ crash into the toll collector’s booth.  And so will everyone else in your vehicle.  Super cool.

I have my iPod in one ear while I drive and I had loaded some excellent new music before the trip up, so I was verily entertained even whilst everyone else was sleeping (/being woken up/ falling back to sleep again).  Traffic was pretty light and the weather was remarkably clear given the hideous storm just hours prior.  We even made it to the other side of Washington, D.C. by about 7:45 a.m., where we stopped for some breakfast, refueling and a leg stretch.  I noticed a party at a long table behind ours that seemed like it had a lot of kids.  There were car seats everywhere.  After watching them while we waited (forever) for our food to come, I realized that there were actually more adults than there were kids… about one mom and dad for every 1.5 babies.  And when I got a true head count I also became aware that there was only one more kid in their party than in mine.  So I realized that I have a lot of kids.  Then I think we contracted a mild case of E. coli from the food because we have all had shooting stomach pains ever since.  Fantastic.

Back on the road we continued to roll along nicely, but with eight hours still ahead of us it seemed like the never-ending road trip.  Certainly the antics from the peanut gallery would help us pass the time…

Every single time there was a noise on the highway or from the vehicle Kid D said, “That was probably a bike falling off.  You should check.  No, really Mom – I think a bike just fell off of our car.  I heard it.”

One time during a period of relative quiet on I-85 just south of Richmond, I began to pass an oil truck.  About mid-way through there was a BANG! that made me presume that someone in the backseat was setting off fireworks.  After first asking if anyone in our car had been shot, I quickly assessed the windshields.  None were cracked, so I can only assume that it was a piece of debris or a rock that shot against our undercarriage.  Holy Crap!  Now I’m definitely awake.

Kid E was in no mood to travel.  He made it clear in the driveway prior to takeoff when he started crying something about how his pillow was “broken” and such.  His lines of the day (meaning he said them no less than a bajillion times) were, “I want to go home.”  I responded with, “That’s what I’m doing, Big Man, driving us home.”  He would then reply, “No!  I want to be home NOW!”  Don’t we all?  “Here, have a roll of Smarties.”  He was clearly buzzing high on sugar by the time we got home.

“I’m hungry,”  “I’m thirsty,” “I want to watch a different movie,” and “I’m bored,” “Where are we?” and “How much further?” were frequent fan favorites of the day.  We also had a couple of the predictable “I have to pee!” and “I have to poop!” emergencies, so we got to see more rest stops on this go around.  Rest stops have gotten a bad reputation lately with the whole foot tapping thing and the sexual predator hangout stereotype, so I had forgotten how clean they usually are.  I was pleasantly reminded each and every time we had to swing into one.  They also have a lot of pretty landscaping now too, which was also nice.

Speaking of rest stop predators, maybe they were keeping all of the police officers busy because I did not see any of either of them.  Well, that’s not totally true, as I did see a few state police cars in North Carolina, but only in the northbound lanes.  I wonder what determines where the police lie in wait to hassle people who just want to get where they are going keep the roads safe from dangerous speeders.  I’d like to know the answer to that so I can avoid those routes whenever possible.

This is how we roll (at the Equator)

Our last stop for refueling was in South Carolina at about 3:30 in the afternoon.  When I stepped out of the car I was assaulted with a chest-crushing heat.  The whole time I was filling the tank (“Jersey Girls don’t pump gas!”) I struggled just to breathe.  Welcome back to Summer in the South.  And so begins two more months of never leaving my house during the day, else I will be soaked through to my underpants in sweat within sixty seconds.  Super Sexy!

Finally, around 5 o’clock we pulled into our driveway.  Yeah!  We were finally home.  It was still an unholy kind of hot outside, but the truck needed to be unloaded so I could pull it into the garage.  As I wrestled the bikes, disassembled the bike rack, climbed atop the truck to empty and detach the cargo bag, pulled everything out of the inside of our vehicle and piled it all in our driveway (I didn’t have five kids for nothing… they were going to carry all of this crap into the house for me), I realized that it was only by a Road Trip miracle (or undetectable extension charm) that all of these things fit inside.

So while the chickens were putting stuff away, I got a nice, cold shower.  Sheepdog was still on the West Coast riding in the Tour of the California Alps Death Ride 2011 (and yes, just based on the name alone I confirmed that his life insurance policy was up to date prior to letting him ride in that race) and we had been gone for close to four weeks, so our cupboards were bare.  I quickly ran out for some necessary groceries and Mexi-food for dinner.  By the time I finally sat down I was too tired to even open a bottle of wine.  Now that’s tired.

… but I would have gotten right back into the car the very next day just to go back to the beach.  Sigh.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Tales from the Trip – Part One

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

First things first… I realize that I forgot to make a Harry Potter reference in Friday’s post.  I will make up for that by doing two today.  My only excuse is that I have a horrible short-term memory.  Seriously, you could tell me something today and I might forget by tonight (unless it is good gossip).  I can re-watch movies and re-read books and I get excited about the endings because I have forgotten what they are.  I am just special that way. 

So I was all mixed up about what day it was from being on vacation and the trip back and I almost posted yesterday.  Then I remembered that there is no post on Sundays.  BAM!

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I survived packing day on Friday.  More importantly, everyone else survived the Master Packer and all the craziness that surrounds me.  My mother-in-law lovingly said I was actually more of a “Mother Packer,” which I thought was kind of sweet.  Either way… I got everything washed, gathered, packed and loaded just as a mega-storm bore down upon the eastern seaboard.

Rewind three hours.  Kid E decided to have a meltdown over nothing/ everything and no one but his Mommy could soothe him.  Unfortunately, my attention needed to be elsewhere.  So the background soundtrack for the Pack was a whiny and crying Kid E as a very sweet and helpful (although sadly ineffective) Kid B held him and tried to calm him down.  This as a news alert flashed across the television screen for a tornado warning in Atlantic County, which we get all the time in Georgia but they rarely see at the beach.  Next thing I realize, Kid D was crying inconsolably.  I went to him to see how I could shut him up calm him down and he explained through heaving chest and jagged sobs that “(he didn’t) want to die in a tornado.”   Me neither, pal.  So you gotta buck up and let mommy do her job.  I can barely do it with one kid’s screams echoing through the house, let alone two.  So, I refocus Kid D with a video game, reassure him that we will go down to the lower level of the house if a tornado does indeed come through and I plow ahead.

I had to load the truck in stages.  First, earlier in the day I attached the cargo roof bag and put all of the beach gear inside.  This had been done prior to the trip up by Sheepdog (who is at least five or even six inches taller than me – P.S. I think I am shrinking) and I had a hard time reaching the roof to put stuff in.  Sheepdog also had a helper (Kid A) and I was in the house taking care of the other kids.  I had no assistants (the girls were driving back from Hershey Park with my mom and dad), it was raining, and the boys yelled off of the deck that they “needed me for an emergency” about 14 times in a half-hour period.  But I got it done.  Check.

Then we had to load the way back of the truck with all of our stuff.  This took most of the day as I had to wash some stuff, direct the girls to pack their things, presume that Kid C would forget most of hers and compensate for that, pack all of the boys’ stuff and my own as well, plus all of the extras.  The storm started up again around dinnertime, so my dad suggested that I back the truck into the garage instead of loading it outside in a rainstorm.  I had to leave it sticking out about two feet so I would have room to attach the bike rack.  The rain kept coming and my dad started pacing in front of the truck because the crazy rain was coming down sideways (of course it was!) and all of his tools were getting wet.  He kept assuring me that it was “not a problem,” yet he was standing in front of the shelves trying to block the weather the entire time.  Then he hung up a towel.  And we still have Kid E throwing a tantrum-to-end-all-tantrums from above.  Awesome, right?  But I got it done.  And loaded.  And we didn’t have to leave anything behind (well, I almost had to leave Kid A’s guitar there – yes, she brought her guitar – but I was able to shift things around and make it all fit.  Check.

Those bikes did not stand a chance against my mad mexican wrestling skills

Finally I was putting the bike rack onto the trailer hitch.  But I couldn’t find the stupid effing cotter pin (it wasn’t actually an “effing” cotter pin until it started hiding from me, so once I found it in the glove box – smart planning on my part, right?  that’s how I compensate for the whole short-term memory loss thing –  the cotter pin and I became friends again).  I made my dad go upstairs because he was just stressing me out.  I wrestled (literally – at one point I was straddled on the bumper doing some Lucha libre moves in order to get the three bikes onto the rack).  But I got them on, strapped them in, and this job was done.  Check.

I was a sweaty mess.  My dad directed me as I backed the truck up so that he could shut the garage door for the night.  It fit by mere millimeters.  Good thing because I didn’t really want to leave the roof bag and the bikes out in a tornado and I don’t know if I could have watched while my dad nailed a tarp to the garage opening.  And trust me, this was surely his next step.

So I went in to diffuse Kid E’s meltdown (yes, he was still actively having one – he is quite tenacious), shower and go to bed.  I set the alarm for 3 a.m. and crashed.  Hard.

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I will continue with part two of this story in tomorrow’s post.  And, yes, I realize that I only included one Harry Potter reference today.  I got to writing and I forgot about it.  And I wasn’t about to rework the whole story.  Lesson of the Day:  If you drink too much in college you will forget stuff when you are old.

Look Out! I’m Packing

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

No, not a gun, which – let’s face it – should in fact scare the bejesus out of everyone who knows me.  There are certainly some days that I could be the poster child for road rage.  I wouldn’t shoot people, mind you, but I would sure as a Swiss watch shoot some tires that belong to the idiots, the texters and the people who can’t be bothered to thank me with a simple wave.  What has happened to manners on the road, people?  No, I am actually packing up to go back home to Atlanta.  But you should still be a little scared of me right now.

Much more apropos that this picture represent peace than that stupid Mercedes sign inside of a circle

You see, I am a Master Packer.  If there were a class in packing, I would have slept through every one then just showed up for the final gotten an A plus.  I would have a Ph.D. in Stowage.  Opportunus Plures res in vegrandis tractus.  I can pack so much into such little space that I often amaze myself.  And I don’t even need those SpaceBag things (while I must admit that they are quite amazing).  My mind just sees a big game of Tetris and I can turn things and flip them and make them fit into other things and then into whatever space I’m working with.  Or I’ll just throw it out/ not bring it with me.

But talent like this does not come without a price.  In the hours leading up to a Big Pack I can become distracted and sullen and moody.  My mind is working so hard to plan and calculate the puzzle that will soon lie before me that I have no time for common social mores, like feeding my hungry children (“Am I wearing a sign that says, ‘Carl’s Slave?'”) or not growling at people just because they have the nerve to speak to me.

I am busy doing laundry, finding duffel bags (they pack much better than inflexible suitcases), tracking lost items, planning for eventualities and random possibilities (do you think Mary Poppins’ bag got packed all by itself?), and re-assembling bike and roof racks.  And then I have to check the DVR to see if the season premiere of Flipping Out recorded yet (priorities!).  I love me some Jeff Lewis.  He always makes me feel better because at least I’m not as crazy as he is.  Plus, it was fantastically funny when he taught that 3-year-old girl to say her favorite drink was chardonnay.  Then I have to pack.  Dun dun dun.

Fortunately for those directly involved in the process, today is cloudy and not at all a good beach day.  Before this weather actually presented itself I had some crazy scheme planned that involved a final day on the beach followed by last-minute loads and loads of laundry and cleaning (and subsequent drying!) of beach gear prior to a late night packing session.  Right, because there is nothing less stressful than a Big Pack on a deadline. (guess what… I got that from my daddy too – heh, heh).

So today will be mildly taxing, but soon enough we will be on the road again.  I am hoping for a drive day that is free of incidents, whining (by me or the kids) and speeding tickets.  A girl can dream, can’t she?  And when we finally get back to Georgia I will open a big bottle of wine.  I am beginning to notice a trend here.

Wish me luck for tomorrow… (I really mean it, because that drive is going to be L-O-N-G)

Don’t Hate Me Because I’m Beautiful

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

It is Wednesday again and yes, I am still slacking off one day a week.  And yes, I am still on my family trip and the kids and I are still having fun.  I am even unexpectedly extending the trip by a few more days in order to drive all of them home, instead of having the girls fly back with my parents.  Twenty five days of being away from home is a long time.  Kids D and E do not remember where we actually live.  They keep asking what our “old” house looks like.  Sheepdog had to go back because he has a J.O.B.  I do not like when the chickens are scattered about, so I’ll be happiest next week when we are all back together again.

Today, however, the boys and I are going to the beach.  The girls are headed to Hershey Park with my parents for a little side trip down Nostalgia Lane (my parents used to take them there when they were little bitties), which should be interesting because my dad is scheduled for knee surgery next Monday morning (which facilitated the change in plans that extended our trip) and is having a hard time walking around.

So my honorary guest post writer today is another sister (I have lots of them), Sister C.  She is beautiful, in her mid-thirties, married to Handsome Rob (formerly Cute Robbie), has three gorgeous kids and is currently pregnant with Number Four.  She is pretty and skinny (despite her diet of candy, gum and Cool Ranch Doritos) and a former Miss New Jersey Teen USA and Miss New Jersey USA contestant (yes, there is a difference and yes, I can explain it so yes, that makes me a pageant dork).  She still does some modeling and acting work.  It is really cool to see her in a television commercial every once in a while (“You’re gonna LOVE it!”).

People often think that girls like Sister C are stuck-up or bitchy or full of themselves.  In fact, Sister C is a great example of things being the complete opposite of what you think they are.  She is quiet and shy, especially in new situations.  She is not very good at small talk or cocktail parties because they make her anxious.  She tends to focus on her own physical flaws that no one else even notices.  Yet she is hysterically funny and uniquely weird (she and a college roommate created their own language – totally bizarre but really funny to hear them use it) around people she feels comfortable with.

She works to make herself a better person – a better wife, mother, sister, friend.  She struggles with the big and little stuff that comes along with marriage and kids and work (she works part-time from home).  She is very much like you and me, except that she is beautiful and wears a size zero.  Now we could all hate her for that, or we could stop being jealous and remember that everybody has their issues and everybody struggles with something.  This bitch just gets to do it in skinny jeans.

So now I proudly present to you Sister C’s post…

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Wrangling the Entropy, Tip #5 by honorary guest writer, Sister C

I have three kids (7, 5 and 2) and one more bun in the oven (no, I’m not as crazy as Stacy with five…but, just one behind).  Someone is getting the old snipperoo after this one pops out, but I’m not naming names.  Life with kids (especially little ones) is crazy and you can get bogged down with the day-to-day and lose the big picture of things very easily, even more so if you are a stay-at-home mom.  I certainly don’t have all the answers, but have found that focusing on three main things helps me to keep looking at the big picture of life.  In no particular order, here they are (and don’t go judging me for not putting God as number one…He kind of ties everything together and will go last):

1. Make time for yourself.  Find an activity that you really enjoy.  For me, it’s tennis.  I took a few lessons as a kid, but never really played until a few years ago.  I joined an ALTA team in Sister B’s neighborhood and immediately loved it.  I don’t think I have missed a season yet (except maybe to have Kid Crazy, #3) and I think I will be playing until I can’t move anymore.  While the season is going on we practice one night a week and have a match every Sunday.  It is a great group of fun girls, who have become really great friends too!  It’s a great escape for me to hang out with friends and to burn off some steam.  I loved tennis so much that I finally convinced my husband (let’s just call him House Captain) that he she should start playing too.  He did and loves it just as much as I do.  We even have played a couple of seasons of mixed doubles and played as partners.  We consider it a date and get a sitter…it has been really fun for us to be a “team” on and off the court.  In addition to tennis, I enjoy jogging, yoga and pilates…sweating for me is the best way to burn off some stress and I try to fit some of that stuff in whenever I can.

Rest is another important “me” activity.  I actually think I have a disorder that I need to sleep so much.  I take a nap pretty much everyday.  That helps recharge me and helps me to not fall asleep by 6:00 pm.

2.  Make time for your spouse.  This can be one of the hardest ones.  You work all day (or watch the kids all day), have dinner, clean up, bathe kids, put them to bed…then the day is almost over and you are exhausted.  Last thing I feel like doing is having anyone else touch me or even talk to me for that matter…I need my decompression time.  But, I have heard way too many stories of middle-aged couples getting divorced because they lost each other along the way of raising their kids.  Then, all the kids leave the house and they don’t know each other anymore.  Not for me, pal.  I have zero interest in starting all over again in the dating arena 20 years from now.  And it ain’t like I’m getting any cuter, less wrinkly or less squishy in areas.

Your marriage is the foundation of your whole family…the rock from which everything else stems.  House Captain and I are lucky enough to travel together quite a bit.  We take a number of trips per year (most years) and that always seems to recharge us.  We also try to do date nights every so often.  About a year or so ago, I made House Captain take this quiz in the book The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman.  It basically tells you what makes you feel the most loved…words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts, acts of service, or physical touch.  Once you know what your spouse’s “love language” is, you can try to cater to that.  You may think that your wife would love it if you brought her home a gift one day, but if her “love language” is physical touch she would probably much rather like a giant hug.  I feel like knowing each other’s language has really caused us to focus more on meeting those needs for each other.

Communication is also huge here…we have to sit down and have heart-to-hearts from time to time to work through something.  House Captain actually remembered a technique that was taught to us in pre-marriage counseling, where you go off separately and write down your feelings about something first, then come together to discuss it.  This prevents things from being said that either one of you might regret (When he brought that up recently, I was like, “lame…I just want to yell at you instead.”  But I was pleasantly surprised at how well it worked.).  Marriage is a lot harder than I ever thought…you have to constantly work at it for it to work right.  You can’t just forget about that part, though, because one day it will just fall apart if you do.

3.  Find a higher power to inspire you.  For me and House Captain, that’s the big guy, God.  I don’t want to come across as a holy roller or anything, but I believe that there has to be a higher power from which you derive faith and strength.  Our marriage, how we raise our children, and how we go about our daily lives revolve around God.  We found our church (shoutout to North Point Community Church) a number of years ago and it took me a really long time to get used to the giant-ness, lack of pews and hymnals, and broadway show-like production of it all.  I generally hate change and this couldn’t have been farther from the church I grew up in.  When I finally opened up a bit I realized that this was just the format to actually make me interested in going to church every week.  I ended up loving the music and the weekly messages are just what I need to keep everything in check…they are constant reminders of how I can be a better person, spouse and parent.  They also have an excellent children’s program and the kids enjoy going.  It can’t hurt for the lessons we are teaching them to be reiterated either…kids need all the positive guidance they can get.

I have learned that it helps for me to hand things over to a higher power.  I can’t carry the burden of everything on my own shoulders.  I have peace in my heart knowing that things happen in life for a reason and I need to trust in that.  Most importantly, I am learning more and more each day that I cannot control or plan everything (hello, baby #4).  Trust me, this is a hard thing for all the Paarz sisters to grasp.

Sister C says, "I love Cool Ranch Doritos almost as much as I love House Captain"