You'd think I'd be Smarter with all this Education...

There's been a lot of stuff going on lately so I'll try not to bore you with all the details of every little thing.

Jack turned 9 earlier this month and he had a few special requests. He asked to decorate his own cake as a model of an animal cell then he was so embarrassed by its imperfections that he wouldn't talk about it or explain it. Sheesh.

Then he asked me if the children at his party could build a model of something - an atom or DNA. A cell cake and a DNA craft? Don't spoil these kids for birthday parties for the rest of their lives. Slow down on the fun, Jack!

In the end, the Pinterest-inspired craft of DNA models with Twizzlers and colored marshmallows turned out pretty well. Despite the fact that the kids didn't listen much to Jack's instructions on pairing the marshmallows by color so it would be more realistic, everyone's DNA was delicious. Which is not a sentence I ever thought I'd write.

Right after the party - like, right after the party, we went camping on our inaugural trip with our new camper. We haven't camped since before Noah was born. So we've doubled our kids since last time. Boy, have we ever. This isn't a cheapo pop-up like our last one, this has four bunks. The table and couch even fold out so we could have like 10 people sleeping in it. We've offered this to both our parents but they have been surprisingly uninterested.

Jack wanted to take a picture of me and told me to act natural. Me trying to read while sitting next to one toddler and having another hanging on my arm was actually pretty natural.

Camping's tough.

Matt's parents brought over his presents on his actual birthday morning in the camper. One of them was a multi-functional tool with a compass and binoculars and such. He happily trooped out to the woods to use it. And yes, that is a first aid kit on his belt loop. A birthday gift from one of his pals. Got a small burn or cut? He's your man.

And then...I graduated. College, that is. I finally, after many months, tears, and glasses of wine, got my Bachelor's of Science in Nursing (BSN - really a Bachelor of Stuff and Nonsense). I've learned a few things over my years as an adult student:

-I really, really hate APA format. I imagine that one of the circles of Hell includes APA format, demons with red pens and rulers, measuring the margins to the millimeter. I had an 8th grade grammar teacher that would have been truly spectacular at that particular position.

-Can we, as adults in education, professors and students alike, all agree of the relative meaninglessness of some degrees? My first nursing degree was chock full of useful information and I hit the ground running every single day. This degree, like many higher education degrees, was full of busywork and papers and rhetoric about professional excellence and scholastic achievements and other such things I simply can't remember anymore.

-In the same vein (oh yes I did), students who started a little later would always ask me and my classmates about the class we were in or had just finished. They'd say "Was Policy hard?" and I'd always reply "Did I take that class? I honestly don't remember. Is nursing policy actually a thing? Doesn't ring a bell..."

-I'd make a terrible professor. The first day of class, I'd sit everyone down and say "Ok, listen up. You and I both know you're here simply as a stepping stone in your career or because your workplace is paying for it or because you'll get a raise because of such and such degree. We can all agree most of this is pretty pointless so let's just do what we have to do to fulfill the college's accreditation requirements and get on out of here. Wendy's is only open until 11 tonight and after reading all these boring textbook pages, I for one am definitely going to need a Frosty."

-I now have three Associate degrees (Arts, Early Childhood Education, and Science) and my Bachelors. If you added them all up, I'd have a Doctorate and a half.

Matt, who even before this was my favorite person, threw me a surprise graduation party. I'm a great person to surprise because I don't know what's going on ever.

Matt coordinated the whole thing with my two best friends, my older sister, my in-laws and my parents. All of the children we have between us are not pictured for obvious reasons.

Finally, we are heading out for a week's vacation time up in NY. Matt is doing some things for work and since he has family in NY and we haven't seen them since Noah was an infant we decided to suck it up and all of us go up to visit. We're leaving at 3am and I should be cleaning to at least bring it up to a respectable level for the family staying at our house with Toby but after all the prep with the trip I simply can't bring myself to clean anymore.

Bag of tricks.

Why yes, cashier at Walmart, we are traveling a long way with small children.

Benadryl is on to us...

And then tonight as we're scurrying around trying to get everything packed and cleaned, the dog puked on the 2 ft of floor rug in the huge, wood-floored family room. Thanks, buddy. Oh and the ironing board fell against the door of the laundry room and broke, wedging the door shut. Matt had to saw it in half so I can finish the last load of laundry that I can't bring myself to fold tonight. The door reminds me of those old-school church nursery doors that were in every church when I was growing up.

At least the housesitters probably won't notice the crushed Cheerios on the floor with a door like this.

Me (as a kid is screaming in the background): "If we make it back from NY with all of the kids, I'll be very surprised."

Matt: "I'll be very surprised if we leave tomorrow morning with all of the kids..."

Birthday Going-Ons and a Tale of Two Companies

This past weekend Noah turned 3 and I turned 32. He's old enough now that he knows we have the same birthday and he got a big kick out of telling me happy birthday so I would tell him the same thing. Lots of laughs. I'm enjoying it because I'm sure when he's 16 he won't find it so funny. At this point I get to decide what we have to eat and where to go and such because 1) he's only 3 and 2) the person who had to endure the birth of an almost 10 lb baby on her birthday gets to choose happy things now.

We were going to head to the beach on Saturday but it's FL in summer so the chance of thunderstorms was high and we ended up swimming and playing Marco Polo and such.

The low point of the day was the mail. We got a bill from a certain cable/internet company (rhymes with Schmomcast) for about $130 more than it should be. So we spent like 2 hrs on the phone with them.

Conversation with Company #1:

Them:  "It looks like these charges were authorized."

Us: "No, they weren't."

Them: "Well, that's debatable."

Us: "Actually, it's not. We just told you neither of us authorized the charges."

Them: "It looks like you only have the economy internet. Are you sure you don't want to upgrade? It's only $5 extra per month. Well, there is also the small surcharge of your soul but you can break that up into easy monthly payments."

Us: "It's a tempting offer but based on how unbelievably terrible your customer service is, we're going to pass."

Them: "Just to be clear, you did just authorize the upgrade, right?"


So that was a pretty frustrating part of the day. Matt thought we should go to Chik-Fil-A so Noah could play. Although fast-food wouldn't be my first choice, I begrudgingly agreed. You know, for the kids and stuff.

Conversation with Company #2:

Me: "Do you do anything special for birthdays? It's mine and my son's birthday today." (Here I'm thinking, free small drink or something).

Them: "I don't think so but let me check with the manager."

Manager: "Can I see your ID to check your birthday?"

(I showed her that today was indeed my birthday)

Manager: "Ok, you guys can order whatever you want."

Really? Really?? Wow. So I ordered for me and Noah and then she said "No, no, all of you can order whatever you want. It's on us."

That's right. They paid for our meals for 6 people. And when we were done, they told us to let them know when we were ready for dessert and that would be on the house too.

Now that is customer service.


The next day we had the family birthday celebration at my parents' house. It was very lovely and Noah was practically swimming in cars and tractors and new Pixar-themed underwear so he was quite the happy camper.

As part of my gift from my in-laws, I got this sign that my mother-in-law picked out for me:

Does she know me or what? We've been good friends since I married Matt 13 years ago and our families have been friends for much longer. We can both agree in friendship that I am not really much into cleaning and I wish I could care more but I just don't.

Jack later read the sign and told me that it's not true; the kids aren't happy because we punish too much. Well, 2 out of 3 ain't bad. That's...wait, that's 66%. Ok, that's failing.

I may be terrible at parenting but I have recently discovered a way to style my hair so it's not too awful.

You can't win them all.