January 28, 2010 by Wendy
Yesterday, Little Miss asked me if she can try out for American Idol when she gets bigger. I told her, of course, if that’s what she wants to do. (And if it’s still on the air when that time comes.)
Last night, she asked her father the same question. I think he gave her about the same answer I did.
This morning, she picked out her audition outfit:
Welcome to Hollywood? Not if I can help it!
Category Little Miss | Tags: | 1 Comment
January 28, 2010 by Wendy
Recently, I went on a little spree of reading autobiographies. I shouldn’t have done that.
You see, two of them were the memoirs of two of my favorite childhood heroines: Laura Ingalls and Marcia Brady. (Don’t judge my 11-year-old intellect here. Anne Frank and Nancy Drew were also my heroines.)
Every little girl (at least the ones I rolled with back then) wanted to be Half-Pint. She was so feisty, so adventurous and she didn’t take crap from anybody. Plus, she was all freckly cute, even with those buck teeth of hers. I wished I had brown hair and freckles. The braids I could do, but they were blond. And I only had three freckles on my nose from the sun. And I didn’t have buck teeth, but I did have big, crooked teeth with a gap.
And Marcia. What girl growing up in the 70s didn’t want to be Marcia? What girl didn’t brush her hair in the mirror 100 times each night, just trying to get it half as shiny and straight as Marcia’s? She was like the Jennifer Aniston of our day. Even when she went through her dorky stage, with her braces and facial moles, she was still pretty and popular, despite that tearful breakdown in the mirror one day, screaming, “I’m ugly! I’m ugly! UGLY!!!” Marcia, you were never ugly, even when you got that football thrown in your face. (So there, Harvey Klinger and Doug Simpson!)
Childhood heroines amassed during your formative years tend to follow you into adulthood, I guess. (Which is why I’m glad my girls have never really latched on to Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus.) So when the autobiographies of two of my heroines came out, of course I was going to read them.
But I sort of wish I hadn’t. Reading these books has shattered my image of both of them, and with that, a little bit of my childhood innocence.
First, I read Maureen McCormick’s Here’s the Story: Surviving Marcia Brady and Finding My True Voice.
Of course, I knew what was coming, from all the press she did preceding its release. I knew she had a cocaine issue and a drinking problem, and of course, I knew that she and Greg had a little thing going during filming back then, having previously read Greg’s own memoirs, Growing Up Brady. (Did I mention I was a Brady Bunch fan?)
Reading about how imperfect her family life really was, and how it (and/or her sudden but pretty shortlived fame) led her down all sorts of very un-Marcia-like paths was certainly interesting, but not a fun read by any means. I didn’t enjoy reading about my calm, cool, pretty and popular heroine lying in bed for days strung out on cocaine. I didn’t enjoy reading about her promiscuity (and not just with Greg; I wish) or her desperation to revive her sinking career. (A country singer, really Marcia?)
It really took away a tiny part of my childhood. I know, no one is as perfect as they seem (except for the Bradys), but I think some of those childhood fantasies should remain as just that. You start reading biographies and you’re messing with your memories that should maybe be left innocent and intact.
After I got over that hot mess, I delved into Melissa Gilbert’s Prairie Tale:
This one was even worse for me, because when I was younger, when I wasn’t busy trying to be Nancy Drew, I wanted to be like Laura.
But after reading her book, I couldn’t stand her. She came across as so full of herself and seemed to think she was a bigger star than she really was. After Little House, I don’t recall her ever starring in anything but a bunch of Lifetime movies (which I don’t watch). I know from reading her book that she did go on to do a lot of movies, just not a lot that I (or anyone but the Lifetime crowd) ever saw. (Except for the Helen Keller movie that was supposed to have re-energized her career.)
But you would think she were of Julia Roberts or Meryl Streep caliber by the way she dropped celebrity names throughout the book, and on a first-name basis like the reader was supposed to know who she meant: “Marty” (Martin Sheen), “Tom” (Cruise), “George” (Clooney, duh) and, get this, “Bill” (Clinton)!
Sure, she was well-connected, as her father was in show business with the big-time names of that generation. But I don’t think she ever got as famous as she wanted, or as famous as the people she surrounded herself with were (especially the “Brat Pack” of the ’80s, including Rob Lowe), and she came across as jealous, resentful and even vengeful at times.
I admit, it was interesting to read about her complicated years-long relationship with Rob Lowe, seeing as I had the biggest crush on him all through high school (who didn’t?) and I still have a little crush on him as Governor McCallister on one of my favorite shows, Brothers and Sisters. It was sad to read about how he dumped her just before their wedding, and about how she had a miscarriage with their baby.
But I would’ve liked to read more about her days on Little House on the Prairie. I did learn that she and Mary Ingalls (Melissa Sue Anderson) didn’t get along, but that she was BFFs with Nellie Oleson (Alison Arngrim). I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Mary always did seem like a stuck-up crab, even before she went blind. And Nellie, well, she cracked me up. Strangely, she barely even mentioned Ma Ingalls.
Mary Ingalls.
Nellie Oleson.
Obviously, one person she did talk about a lot throughout the book was Michael Landon, my beloved Pa Ingalls. Just look at that man:
To me, he embodied everything a man should be. And I’m so thankful I married a man like him. A man who can be sensitive but who can also fix and build things, oh, and fight off the Injuns once in a while. I often say that BK is my “Pa Ingalls.” (I think my sisters just threw up a little.)
But then Laura—I mean, Melissa—had to ruin that, too.
In her book, she refers countlessly to his drinking ways, his volatile temper, his signature scent of cigarette smoke and alcohol.
Yuck. Thanks a lot, Half-Pint. I’m sure he and his family appreciate that portrait you painted of him as he lies in his grave.
R.I.P., Pa.
Of course, I didn’t expect this book to be all about life on the Little House set. But I also didn’t expect it to be bragging proudly about her promiscuity. (She was a bigger skank than Marcia, by the way. Those buck teeth sure didn’t stop her from getting any action.)
I don’t mean to be so judgmental of her; I just don’t like her anymore after reading this book. It’s not because of the things she did. Obviously, everyone makes mistakes and it’s especially difficult when it’s done publicly. Some might say say she is brave to tell her story, sordid parts and all. (Maybe, but she’s also getting paid a lot to tell it.) What I found off-putting was her snarky attitude and her overabundance of self-esteem that permeates the book.
Making it even worse was her use of foul language throughout the book. It’s one thing if you talk that way, but entirely another to write that way. It’s not like it’s something that accidentally slips or is used without thinking. When you’re writing a book, obviously every word is more carefully thought out and then goes through multiple editors before it’s published. (Unlike blog writing, by the way.) I mean come on, using the “F” word as an adjective every few pages? She’s an actress; she is supposed to be more creative than that.
Plus, Half-Pint isn’t supposed to be dropping F-bombs.
Now if Chelsea Handler wants to use it in her books (yes, I’ve read a couple, so what, I love her, she’s funny) , that’s another thing. It’s part of her shtick.
Now that my childhood innocence has been ripped away, I think I’ll take a break from reading autobiographies. Well, maybe after I read Sarah Palin’s Going Rogue. I don’t think reading her book is going to shatter any images of her for me. Sadly, she’s already done a pretty good job of that herself. Or maybe it’s the media that has. We’ll see after I read the book.
And then I’m done with autobiographies for a while, at least until a good one comes out. (But at the moment, I can’t think of anyone whose I would be interested in reading.) You certainly won’t catch me reading Mackenzie Phillips’ recent release (too gross!), nor her co-star Valerie Bertinelli’s.
I’m pretty sure even Screech from Saved by the Bell has written an autobiography. I can’t imagine anyone would care much to read his, even when his show was in its fluorescent-clothes-and-mall-bangs heyday.
Now I promise, that was the first and last time Screech will ever be mentioned on this blog.
Category Media Fodder | Tags: Brady Bunch,Laura Ingalls,Marcia Brady | 2 Comments
January 20, 2010 by Wendy
Another day, another recall. Every day it seems, there’s another recall and for some reason lately, it always seems to be something that we have in our possession.
Today, it’s Graco strollers. I’m not so freaked out about that one, even though I’m pretty sure the stroller I have is one of the models being recalled due to finger amputations and lacerations. We don’t use the stroller very much anymore, so I’m not going to freak out about it. Plus, vomiting is not listed as one of the dangers, which, as anyone who knows me, knows that is my biggest phobia in life. (Another post, another time.)
It was a different story last week with the whole Tylenol/Motrin/Benadryl recall issued by Johnson & Johnson. People were vomiting from taking Tylenol! That’s all I needed to hear to get me in full panic/research mode. We have a lot of Tylenol products in our medicine cabinets. Thankfully, we don’t take it a lot (well, I do) but when it comes to bringing down a fever, it’s a miracle. I have no idea how it works, but it does.
Ironically, I was actually looking up how much Tylenol it takes to damage your liver (as I probably take it more than I should to manage my headaches) at the exact moment when an email from my dad with a link to the recall story dinged in my mailbox. Isn’t that ironic? Or is it coincidental? I don’t know, BK is always pointing out my improper use of the terms interchangeably, but let’s not worry about that now.
So back to my recall panic. The word “recall” always perks up my ears and sends me immediately to the computer to research it (especially when vomiting is a side effect), and then to my medicine cabinets/pantry/garage/kids’ rooms or wherever the offending product may be lurking. So here’s what my desktop looked like last week:
There I was, typing every lot number into the site’s search box to see if it had been recalled. Of course, this was after opening every bottle first and taking a whiff to see if I could detect the “moldy smell” that was being reported as the hallmark of these tainted products.
“Does this smell moldy to you?” I asked BK with each bottle opening. “They need to define ‘moldy’ better. What’s ‘moldy?’ Or is it mildew? I don’t know if I’ve ever smelled mold before. This smells kind of chemical-ly, is that mold?” I asked, I guess to no one in particular since no one answered me.
Come to think of it, I pulled out a lot of drugs from the medicine cabinet that day. And that was only from the kids’ bathroom. I didn’t even do ours yet. (Hmm, could this ample supply be the reason for my need to Google “acetaminophen and liver damage” that day?)
My friend Candi can so relate to this, but I’ll bet she has me beat in the arsenal of meds she’d be able to haul out of her cabinets. She was out of town for the weekend so I couldn’t call her and share my panic about whether I’ve given my kids these tainted medicines, seeing as they’ve been on store shelves for two years, according to some of the articles I read.
When I read the side effects of ingesting these moldy meds—nausea, vomiting, diarrhea—I thought back to the times my kids did vomit after I gave them a dose of these meds. Exactly twice, but I think one had swine flu that may have caused it, and the other time was more like three years ago. Did I poison them? Is it already too late? Has damage been done? All this went through my mind as I typed in those lot numbers.
None of them came up as the offenders, but how do I know they’ve all been tested? How do I know the company is telling the public everything? How do I know the site information is accurate?
Sometimes it’s so hard to live with myself.
When a product has been recalled, it’s pretty much banned for life in our house. (Just like if I or one of the kids vomits, whatever was last eaten is never to be eaten again, i.e., pork tenderloin, chicken chimichangas, Cornish hens, etc. But like I said, another post another time.) I still can’t bring myself to buy fresh spinach, I freak out if someone puts alfalfa sprouts on my sandwich at a restaurant, and the recent peanut butter recall? That was the worst.
That was a particularly busy day, and I had grabbed a few packs of those Austin peanut butter crackers for the girls and I to snack on while we were at some practice or a game. That night on the news, I heard “peanut butter recall” and waited for the brands to be announced.
Oh, good, it was just the industrial kind used in schools and hospitals, and my kids never buy school lunches so I figured I was in the clear.
Until they said it’s also sold in Keebler-brand cracker products. I knew ours were Austin, sold in that huge box at Costco, so I thought we were OK. But then during a commercial break, I decided to double-check and walked into the pantry.
There, in small print on the box, it said, “distributed by Kellogg’s.” It might as well have said “Danger: Contains deadly arsenic. Do not consume.”
Of course, I freaked, and it went something like this:
Me: “The girls and I ATE those TODAY!”
BK: “So?”
Me: “So, they might have salmonella in them!”
BK: “Oh, the chances the ones you had are tainted are so miniscule, and then even if they were, you won’t get sick.”
I’m so not like him.
Already feeling nauseous, I immediately consulted my BFF Google to find out what to expect if you’ve ingested Keebler crackers. My research indicated that the incubation period of this salmonella contracted from the peanut butter was 1-5 days. Those five days were the worst. It was the only time I envied people whose kids had a peanut allergy, because they certainly didn’t have anything to worry about with this particular recall. I was on high alert for the onset of any symptoms from any of us, and when we all came through without as much as a single stomachache, we celebrated on Day 6. No, we really did. I think we toasted at dinner. (Well, I did. No one else really seemed concerned.)
I’m still stressing about the recent recall of cheap children’s jewelry imported from China and sold at Claire’s because it contains toxic cadmium and lead, because, well, I have twin tweens! Are there any tweens who don’t covet that cheap stuff from Claire’s? Their jewelry boxes are loaded with the stuff!
Here’s what BK says about that: “Oh, I’m sure it’s fine, as long as they’re not putting it in their mouths, which I don’t think they are at this point.”
“No, it’s even if it touches their skin!” I say, adding “Clean out girls’ jewelry boxes” to my to-do list.
This is almost as bad as the whole Polly Pocket recall a couple years ago, after which we decided to just throw everything away if it said “Made in China.” We didn’t though, once we realized that would be enough stuff to furnish two entire toy aisles at Target, and poor Little Miss’ toybox would be empty!
What isn’t made in China? Didn’t Walmart once have that campaign touting that everything they sell is made in the USA? What happened to that? I’m pretty sure most of their inventory comes from China. A lot of it has that “Made in China” smell.
And there is a definite smell. A few years ago when I was hosting Thanksgiving, I bought a set of chargers from Costco, and was so proud of my Martha Stewarty table. But when we all sat down, everyone kept saying, “What’s that smell?” and “I smell gasoline.” After we figured out it was the chargers—which sure enough, had a “Made in China” sticker on the bottom—we discarded them immediately. The table was less pretty, but it sure was nice to smell stuffing and turkey rather than bug spray and petroleum. From then on, I’ve been able to detect that smell, whether it’s on a toy or even a pack of stickers or greeting cards.
But now I’ve got more lot numbers to type into drug-recall site. If you want to join me, you can find it at the McNeil Consumer Healthcare site. If anything, it’s a good excuse to clean out your medicine cabinet anyway. I actually found some nasal spray that expired in 2004 and some Nyquil from the 1900s. Well, it was only 1998, but I wouldn’t risk it. It might cause vomiting.
Category Phobias & Freakouts Fodder | Tags: phobias,recalls | 4 Comments
January 19, 2010 by Wendy
OK, this little story is too bizarre to not blog about.
So, first, a little background:
I hate scorpions. Hate them. Like, when I see them in the house, I want to call them names. (Well, I do call them names, but only when no one else is around, and I’m not afraid to admit that I have, on occasion, flipped them off.) Luckily, we rarely get them in the house, but when we do, it’s an event. Out come the camera, a jar to put it in, and of course, the shrieks and screams. (My younger sister hates them too, so whenever we get them in our houses, we always send each other a picture, I don’t know why.)
So the other day, right after BK got home from work and was being followed by the incessantly chatty Twin A telling him about her day, she was standing with him at the bathroom sink when she noticed it. A big, fat scorpion, right where I would be standing brushing my teeth just a few hours later.
We hadn’t seen one in a long time, and ironically, the day before, my mother-in-law gave me a bottle of her homemade anti-scorpion spray, a concoction of boiled orange oil or something. I just sprayed our exterior doorways with it that day, so either it doesn’t work or it drove them in.
So Twin A ran and got me out of the kitchen, I got the camera, Twin B got the Flip cam. For perspective, I found a nearby quarter and gingerly threw it down next to the little jerk (that’s one of my nice names) and took this picture:
I’m not sure what’s grosser—the scorpion or the hair all over the bathroom floor I noticed in this close-up photo. (I vacuumed the next day.) Anyway, my hero BK bravely slapped an empty peanut butter jar over it (we save them for this very reason) and then slid a piece of paper underneath that before flipping it over. He’s an expert at this technique. I am not. Once, when he wasn’t home, I found one crawling up the wall of the girls’ playroom—the ones that can climb walls, by the the way, are the most deadly, venomous bark scorpion. I got as far as putting the jar over it but didn’t think ahead about bringing a piece of paper or cardboard with me, and it took about 15 minutes for one of the girls to locate one, and then I got too scared to pull the jar off the wall. After about a half-hour of this, my arm was aching and shaking so badly that I just had to make myself do it. No more than 5 minutes later, BK walked in the door. Of course, I acted all brave and like it was no big deal when I told him what just happened.
OK, so back to the other night, and here’s where it gets weird. He puts it in the jar, puts a lid on it and Little Miss wants to hold it.
“Ewwww!” the twins and I say in unison. Making it worse, she was in shorts and had no qualms about holding the thing against her bare legs:
I know it was in a jar, but still. That was just creepy. She just kept staring at it and talking to it, even though I kept saying, “Ewww, put that down! Take it outside!” as I’m trying to make dinner amid the chaos. The weird thing is, well, besides the fact that our daughter was talking to a scorpion, that the girl enthralled with it is our girliest girl. She’s all about princesses, Barbies, hairstyles and beautiful singers, not deadly, venomous desert creatures! This is the girl who screams and turns ghostly white if a fly lands on her arm or there’s a spider in her bathroom.
Later that night, the twins and I were snuggled up on the couch watching American Idol. For some reason, Little Miss thinks that I am her sole property and no one but her should be sitting next to me. So she starts with the sad protruding bottom lip, then the tears, and then “Why are you guys sitting by Mommy? I get to sit next to Mommy!”
“I don’t see the girls all day long,” I said. “You get me all to yourself all day, so now it’s their turn,” I say.
Then the crying really starts, making us miss half the “Pants on the Ground” song.
I call BK into the room and ask him to sit with her, telling her, “Poppy wants to sit with you, he hasn’t seen you all day!”
He scooped her up and started playing with her, but she wasn’t having it. She got up, took one longing glance at the girls and I on the couch, and then took off. A minute later, she came wandering back in, sad-faced and sniffly—with the scorpion jar cradled in her arm. She hopped back up into BK’s lap, sniffling and hugging that jar like it was a teddy bear.
It was all so disturbing yet hilarious yet crazy yet heartbreakingly sad all at the same time. “That’s soooo pathetic!” I said, as the twins and BK were practically convulsing with hysterical laughter. I wish I had snapped a picture, but I was just too weirded out to think about getting the camera.
By the next day, Little Miss gave it a name: Scorpia, and declared it a girl. When it came time to go pick up the twins from school, Little Miss insisted that Scorpia come along for the ride.
“NO WAY!” was my first response. The thought of driving around with that thing gave me the heebie-jeebies.
“But Scorpia is my friend, and I will be sad to leave her home all alone,” she pleaded with her sweet big blue eyes.
“Fine,” I agreed, super reluctantly. That sweet face makes me such a pushover.
I screwed the lid onto that peanut butter jar as tightly as I could and handed it to her. “Do NOT, under any cirucmstances, loosen this lid, and don’t shake it around,” I told her sternly, although why I cared if it got shaken up, I don’t know.
“OK, but can you carry her because I have my Barbie and I can’t carry her, too,” said Little Miss as we walked out to the garage.
“Fine,” I again said in my exasperated tone.
I buckled her (the child, not Scorpia) into her seat and handed her the jar for our journey.
Then she says, “Can you take her up front with you because my Barbie will be scared of her and I don’t want her to be scared, so you should bring her up front with you, OK?”
You’ve got to be kidding me.
“Fine,” I said, setting the jar into the console next to the drink-holder cups, hoping that it wouldn’t roll onto my flip-flopped feet and freak me out while I was driving.
When I got to the school pickup line, I texted BK, “OK, we need a dog. The scorpion now has a name and someone insisted we bring her to pickup.” I attached this picture:
I could not believe I was driving around with a scorpion in my car. Scorpia, by the way, was looking a little sluggish in her airtight jar. But I gave her a shake, and yep, she was still alive. Dang.
Later that night, the girls were watching Mulan, and this is how I found Little Miss:
“Why are our kids so weird?” I whispered to BK as I pointed her out. (We say this kind of a lot. He just said it on Sunday at church, when we noticed that Twin B had a stack of coins all bundled up in yarn to put in the collection basket. When I nudged BK and pointed it out, he whispered, “Why are our kids so weird?”)
When I told my mom the scorpion story, she said, “You guys need a dog.” It’s true, we do need a dog, and we’ve been in discussions about it for the past two years, but that’s an entirely different blog post.
Later that night, I noticed that Scorpia had been placed on one of the walls in the dining room. She had become part of the decor, right along with our granite and Venetian plaster. Everyone is going to want to jump on this trend:
“Um, that’s not staying there,” I said when I noticed. But then when I gave the jar another shake, I also noticed that Scorpia didn’t react. Scorpia had passed.
“Good, now can we throw her away?” I said, probably a little too callously.
“No!” shouted an on-the-verge-of-tears Little Miss. “Can we bury her in the back yard?”
“Oh, sure, because I have nothing better to do than to have a scorpion funeral,” I said.
“Can we? Can we have a funior for her? What’s a funior?” said Little Miss.
That was four days ago. She still has not been properly interred. Garbage day is Monday.
I’m thinking services will be held Monday courtesy of Waste Management. In lieu of flowers, we are accepting donations of jars.
Category Little Miss, Odd Fodder | Tags: desert | 6 Comments
January 12, 2010 by Wendy
As a Christmas gift to our parents this year, my sister and I decided to get our total of six kids together for a professional photography session so that we can give their grandparents a nice framed photo of all the grandkids together. We had done this nearly four years ago and it was a complete disaster. In fact, getting professional photos taken of just my three alone in any combination has always been some kind of disaster.
The first time we tried to take the twins for their first photo session, when they were just three months old, it was a disaster. We had gone to Kiddie Kandids in the mall, and because the photographers (a k a the bored teenagers working the cameras) couldn’t magically get two babies to cooperate at the same time, we spent the entire day at the mall, trying for a photo for a while, then walking the mall to calm them down, then unsuccessfully trying again, taking nursing and changing breaks, trying again, walking the mall, trying again, etc. This went on for six hours before the photographers suggested we come back the next day. We did, and it was nearly as bad. Plus, they ended up catching a nasty cold from the photographer who kept sneezing in their faces. Looking at that photo today brings the whole awful day back and makes me hate the mall.
Another time, when it was just Little Miss at 18 months old, she toppled off the silly prop chair they put her on, hit her face on another prop and suffered facial lacerations that took two weeks to heal before we could come back again. (Not to mention her puffy, tear-and-snot-stained face.) No amount of retouching could have fixed that disaster.
When we took all the kids (my three and my sister’s three) to another studio four years ago, it was even worse. Getting six kids—which then included two infants, one sleeping, one awake—to cooperate was impossible and the photographer hated us. He was this surfer dude who just kinda stood there staring at us, like he was waiting for us to pose the kids. Meanwhile, I’m thinking he should be doing something other than standing there with his camera propped up on his stomach, checking his watch. He could’ve, I don’t know, grabbed a feather duster and made a silly noise or something to make them laugh or at least just crack a half-smile for one shutter click. With no direction, the kids were getting bored and restless and then silly, then the babies started crying. The guy was all, “Hey, I can’t help it if your baby is crying, what am I supposed to do, they’re your kids.”
Then he got all offended when we didn’t like his prop suggestions (like put the babies in a creepy Rosemary’s Baby bassinet) and became downright rude to us. My sister ended up crying in the bathroom, which prompted me to ask him to try to be more patient, to which he said, “I don’t know what kind of magic you think we can do. We’re not miracle workers here.” (Those were his exact words, pulled straight out of the letter I ended up writing to the corporate headquarters of Portrait Innovations.) Yeah, that’s right, I said the name. Your photographer was rude and should go back to taking pictures for Surf Dude magazine or wherever he came from. And our kids don’t need “miracle workers,” anyway.
So when my sister suggested we do this again this year, I ca-ringed.
“Come on, the kids are older this time, it’ll be better,” she implored after I expressed my resistance and dread.
But she knew of someone who did child photography on the side, and we decided an outdoor location would be better than a studio.
“Fine, I’ll do it,” I told her. “But I’m not doing the rolled-up jeans and white shirt thing.” (She always suggests that for these things.)
So we chose an area near our home that’s surrounded by greenery and pretty architecture, ringed by upscale boutiques and restaurants. In other words, not the kind of place where the patrons appreciate six hyper kids running around (it was a Friday afternoon, the last day of school before fall break) and being fussed over and yelled at by their two stage moms.
It all started fine, until boys being boys, one of them turned over a lid to one of those in-ground meter boxes and discovered a black widow. Like, a real black widow with the telltale red hourglass on its stomach:
There went the boys’ attention span for posing, and the two littlest girls began shrieking when they heard the word “spider.” It was cool to see (the spider, not the shrieking girls), and I took this photo, which my sister blew up into posters for the boys’ rooms. They loved it. The very cute photographer, whom we suspect had a date waiting, did not love it. Once we got everyone’s attention again, it all went downhill from there.
Trying to get all six kids to cooperate, maybe smile or at least appear normal, all at the same time was impossible. One or two were always looking away, or squinting, or blinking, or making a ridiculous face, or had swollen allergy eyes or messed-up hair. See for yourself:
The nephew in the red sweater? That’s the one I call the “photo bomber,” now that I know “photo bombing” is a real thing. There are sites all over the Internet where people post their photos crashed by one of these “photo bombers,” or people who purposely try to get into other people’s photos and ruin them. He does this all the time, and it really annoys me, but little did I know he was onto something. There he is doing his thing in the third photo down. And so is some other random kid. We don’t know him. Apparently “photo bombing” is catching on quickly with the young.
I just noticed that said nephew is completely missing in the first one. Where did he go? Probably “photo bombing” some other family taking holiday photos. I also just noticed my husband’s legs in that one, and some other guy’s legs on a bench in the others. (Where’d you find this “professional photographer” guy again, sis?)
At one point, the photographer said to me, “Family gatherings must be real fun in your family, huh?” Even though he had somewhere to be, he was a lot more patient with us than rude surfer dude.
Then it was time to move on to the next spot. That produced even worse results:
Yeah, now those are some quality Christmas card photos! Posing six restless, bored, hungry kids straight into the sun does not make the best photo op. And check out “photo bomber” in the second one. I don’t think anyone was saying, “Say cheese!” but they sure weren’t saying “Shout out a random song!” either.
Next, the photographer decided to pose everyone by a pretty waterfall. Seriously? A waterfall? With these monkeys? The whole time, three of the six of them were begging to climb it. In their holiday finery. Yeah, right, kids. So this is the best we got out of them:
Lots of shots were taken here, but this here folks, this is the best of the worst. I challenge you to find a photo worthy of enlarging and framing. Silly faces, eyes closed, mouths open, and Twin A chooses now to be fascinated with the effects of hair gel in the “photo bomber’s” hair? All I can say is, thank goodness for digital photography.
Although it didn’t really do us much good. At the end of the session, the photographer gave me a flash drive with 381 photos. When I got home and downloaded them onto my computer, I realized that not one of them was usable, at least not in the way we intended. For her Christmas card, my sister was able to find a nice one of her three alone (before we arrived at the scene and encouraged the chaos, apparently), and for mine, I used a snapshot that I had taken of them after the photographer escaped—I mean, left. I think we chose this one for our parents’ gift:
It’s nice, but I can just see “photo bomber” struggling to try to stay composed. Just look at his clenched fist.
The adventure didn’t end there. After all that energy was forced to be bottled up, the kids—OK, the boys—couldn’t take it anymore. While we were all busy gathering up all of our stuff (and I was busy trying to take my own pictures), the boys somehow found the utility box for the whole complex. This is where it gets a little fuzzy. All I know is that they were flipping switches that probably shouldn’t be flipped, and the next thing we know, thousands of Christmas lights suddenly come on. They may or may not have been on a timer and it may or may not have been just coincidence that it happened when they were flipping these switches, but let’s just say it wasn’t even near dusk yet, and I’m pretty sure the lights should not have come on for at least another hour.
It was then that I noticed a rather large man in a chef’s outfit, standing outside one of the upscale restaurants, arms crossed, staring at all of us.
“Let’s GO!” I said to my sister, who was either oblivious to or just accustomed to the commotion.
“I’m hungry,” she said. “Wanna go to dinner at one of the restaurants here?”
“Uh, no,” I said. “Do you see that guy over there?” I said, gesturing with my eyes at crabby chef man. “Does he LOOK like he wants us in his restaurant?”
And then we left, exhausted, cranky and hungry. And that was just the grownups. The kids had a ball, once the photo session was over.
Now fast-forward to Christmas Day, when everyone was over at our house. The kids were instructed to wash their hands before dinner, and I had to grab my camera when I saw them all piled up in the bathroom:
That photo turned out to be better than the 381 photos taken a few days before. Well, except for “photo bomber’s” goofy expression. And the ever-present bikini top on Little Miss.
I just picture my parents, admiring the photo we did choose, hanging on their wall, having no idea what it took to get that sorta cute photo. We should have brought the camcorder instead. A picture is worth a thousand words, but a video of this day? Now that would be a novel.
Category Family Fodder, Holiday Fodder | Tags: | 7 Comments
January 7, 2010 by Wendy
Last night, in an attempt at sticking to one of my New Year’s resolutions of bringing more religious education into our home, I read Little Miss the story of creation from a children’s Bible. There were a lot of words and no pictures on the first page, so her interest waned pretty early. (Like, about “and on the first day, God said, ‘Let there be light’ ” early.) Even though she was styling her Ariel doll’s hair and bouncing all over the bed as I read, I thought maybe she was absorbing something and kept reading.
I’m not sure what it was she was absorbing, because when I got to the end, after God had created Adam, and later Eve from one of Adam’s ribs, I thought for sure I’d get some questions about how a woman can be made out of a man’s ribs.
Nope.
Instead, I got: “Is Adam the guy with the black nail polish and the black lines all over his eyes?”
I knew exactly who she was talking about.
Not:
But:
Yep, she thought the Adam was American Idol‘s Adam Lambert, most recently infamous for his less-than-family-friendly antics on the American Music Awards show.
Her question only cemented that New Year’s resolution of mine. And boy, do I have a looonnggg way to go. When we get to the story of Jonah, I’ll have to remember to clarify ahead of time that we’re not talking about the Jonas Brothers.
Category Little Miss | Tags: | 4 Comments