Shavuot Update

Shavuot was awesome. KoD drove up, arriving the afternoon right before Yom Tov, but it was still Prince ChatterBox’s birthday. The prince received his present from us once the KoD had arrived safe and sound and had a chance to catch his breath. This (pic on left) is his gift from us – he asked the KoD for one about 3 months ago.  The kid made out like a bandit for his birthday!

 

We had some awesome meals over the holiday – only one of which was cooked by me. We even had a cheesecake taste test and so totally overdid the dairy – but it was soooo worth it. We socialized a lot with great friends. KoD did the shul bit – I stayed home to start reading the Twilight series. I finally decided to find out what all this hype was about. I read the first two, have handed them on to my eldest prince to read, and all the princes will read their way through them. The stories are not complicated, but I can see how teens have gone crazy over the books. They are no Harry Potter though.

 

KoD went back to NY earlier today. This parting thing – it never gets any easier. Every time he leaves or I leave I feel as if my heart is ripping apart. I try not to cry – but being an emotional being I end up in tears.  I know we will be together again soon, but it is never soon enough. We need prayers to help expedite the visas so that we can be one big happy family. I know it is all in G-d’s hands, but the waiting is just so tough.

 

Every time I see my KoD, my love for him grows stronger. I could never imagine loving someone I didn’t give birth to this much, and certainly not at my stage in life. My KoD is such a gift from G-d and I am so very thankful that we got to spend Shavuot together, and I am thankful for any time that we get to be with each other.

 

OK I am getting way too sappy for a Sunday night. I shall wish you all a wonderful week. I shall be power walking a lot this week as I ate so many thousands of calories in the last few days!!

Where can I get one? That’s cool.

 

It is my little one’s birthday today. He asked for star wars stuff. His oldest two brothers (with help from his mother) bought him some Star Wars Lego sets and Prince HockeyFan bought him a light saber.

 

I posted the same photo on my FaceBook page, and in a private birthday album sent to friends and family – and no less than five grown males emailed me / contacted me that they would love to have a light saber too, where can they get one.

 

Do boys ever grow up? Or do you stay children forever?

 

Thing is, as things go, getting a light saber for a grown up isn’t such a terrible tragedy. Its when men drive their own cars that they worked hard to pay for and you hear them making the vroom vroom sound as they drive, I think then you have to be concerned.

 

Sigh….boys and their toys.

Wednesday’s Wacky Signs

Earworm of the day

Cover your nees [sic]

 

Jacob Da Jew  tweeted and blogged the link to this article I don’t know what surprised me more, the article or the comments or the subject of the article. Basically in Lakewood a woman’s child was handed a note to give to his mother telling her that her knees were showing. The comments are ……… I don’t even know what to say…..

Simply The Best

I get to start my day with a cuddle from Prince ChatterBox. It is just so yummy. He’ll be 7 on Thursday but still loves to curl up on my lap, put his arms around my neck and snuggle. It is so precious. I appreciate it even more because I know in a few short months / years it won’t happen any more. My two oldest are way too big to sit on my lap and cuddle even if they wanted to, which of course, being teenagers, they totally don’t. Prince HockeyFan still likes a hug in the morning, but not this snuggleupableness that I get with the little ‘un.

 

It’s enough to get the grumpitude out of anyone.

Disgusted

 

I received an email from a friend / acquaintance who is in shidduchim. She is a Baalat Tshuva of some years, and is in her early 30s.

 

She was recently introduced to a shadchan in New York who wants to start setting her up on dates. She told me that she stormed out of the meeting with this person when the questioning got too personal. Is it normal for a shadchan to ask either party, male or female, if they are a virgin or even how many sexual partners they have had??!!

 

My friend was so disgusted that she left, and doesn’t really want to go see any shadchanim after that. I can’t blame her. What is this world coming to? Would they ask that of an FFB? If a person chooses not to answer – does that count against them?

 

I feel ill.

Don’t pee on my parade, a WWYD?

I wrote this originally before the wedding (3 months ago), but have slightly updated it. Sometimes I write something and am not ready to post it then, but I am ready now.

 

With every simcha (happy event) there is always going to be someone predicting doom and gloom. Generally it is a family member who knows “better” than the celebrants themselves, although sometimes it is a “friend”. I call these people “parade pishers”.

 

We have such a pisher. This person is someone that has been close to me, and always was there for me when needed. Let’s call this one PP. PP has always spoken his mind, was never shy of telling me an opinion, but it was ok for me to disagree, it was enough that I heard what PP said. PP told me he wanted nothing more than for me to find the man of my dreams, settle down and marry and be happy forevermore. Until it happened. Then there was a whole host of issues that were brought up. Issues about me being selfish and not thinking of the best interests of the children, me putting myself first, that moving away is wrong, that getting married was a terrible idea, how well do I even know the KoD etc.

 

This PP has continued on his quest to undermine and judge every move I make. It has come to the point that things that have come out of his mouth are so hurtful and wrong and just show how far from objectivity he has fallen.

 

This PP even went so far as to enlist the “help” of others to try to convince us we were making a mistake. This “help” backfired as we found out about it, and were appalled at how far PP tried to infiltrate our lives to get what he wanted. I firmly believe that in his messed-up mind PP thinks he is acting in my best interests. My issue now is whether I let PP know that we know his scheme. It’s obvious, unfortunately, that PP cannot be trusted with any more confidences, but do I let it slide, or do I confront this PP? I miss his friendship and wonder whether he is aware that he has hurt me.

 

WWYD?

80s chick and proud of it!

I know it’s almost the next decade of the 2000s but there are some major parts of me that are still stuck in the 80s. I was born in the early 1970s, so I look on the 80s as my coming of age years. My favourite movies – Flashdance, Dirty Dancing, Pretty in Pink, Footloose, Fame etc – I have them all on DVD and watch them often.

 

I still wear legwarmers and still possess off the shoulder sweatshirts like Alex did in Flashdance. We all tore up our jeans – which is so standard now. I remember my grandma being so shocked with those jeans, offering to sew up the rips. We wore big shoulder pads like they did on Dynasty and Dallas. We wore slouch socks (I still have some) and keds. We had those clip thingies to tie a knot in our shirts.

 

I know all the words to Madonna’s songs and can croon all of Lionel Richie’s love songs. The first song I remember being performed on TV was Wham!’s Wake Me Up Before You Go-go – I was home sick and it was daytime TV. We loved Duran Duran and dreamed of meeting Michael Jackson.

 

I miss the days when I had big hair and tied lace in it, to match the fingerless lace gloves that I still possess. I liked a mullet on a guy back then – thankfully that has changed! We spent hours crimping our hair too – no one does that anymore. Not sure if that is a good thing or not. We even wore ponytails on the sides of our heads. Can’t really carry that off anymore at my age.

 

I became an expert on the handheld orange Donkey Kong game and the red Mario brothers game. I can still hear the tune in my head. We learned what Atari was and spent hours playing PONG – the kids today would be bored rigid playing that game! We broke our heads trying to do the Rubik’s cube – my brother solved it…. We also thought boom boxes were the coolest thing. I remember in the mid 80s my brother got a rubber keyed computer – the ZX Spectrum, which we operated with a tape recorder to save our BASIC programs.

 

The Care bears and the Cabbage Patch dolls – we all wanted them, the my little ponies too. Strawberry Shortcake – if you had any of her stuff you were set for life in school.

 

Oh what a trip down memory lane, and it all started with my buddy posting a youtube video on my FaceBook of limahl with “a neverending story.”

 

What are your favourite 80s memories?

Jewish Wedding Network

Please go over to the Jewish Wedding Network to read my piece on Mikvah. Click around the site too – it’s awesome. Thank you JWN for the opportunity to write for you.