Did I hear you right?

I’m sick.   And I’m sick enough to know that I needed to go to the Dr. today for an ear infection that started a few days ago.

I make the appointment with the nurse practitioner since that was the only way I was getting in today.

It’s fine.  I like her a lot.

As I’m waiting, the nurse to the nurse practitioner shows up to take the standard blood pressure, temp, pulse numbers for the chart.

She then asks “Do you still get periods?”

OUCH, nurse.

Did I catch the virus that makes me look 15 years older?

The Dr. arrived  asks how I am.  I tell her that I was fantastic and that I guess it’s my lucky day because I do in fact still get a period.

She asks what’s going on and then I confess “I put coconut oil in my ear and Pinterest made me do it”

She does the usual looking and poking and proceeds to diagnose a sinus infection with a “raging” ear infection.

As she writes some stuff down she asks “Do you need anything else?”

I say “I could use my garage cleaned out”

She says they can do that but it’s  going to have to be another appointment.

I pause.

Whaaa?

I know I’m not hearing that well so I say “another appointment?”

And then she sort of whispers while gesturing with her hands in a circular motion around her lady parts and says “You did say g  a  r a  g  e right?”

“Oh my god… YOU THOUGHT I WAS USING CODE WORDS FOR MY LADY GARAGE.”

And then she realizes I was serious about like, my real garage, not my lady garage.

And we laughed.

Awkwardly.

 

 

 

Walk like an Egyptian….Party!

Parties have been sort of easy to pull off in recent years.   Once I realized how to farm them out, we did.  We ran the circuit of indoor bounce houses, bowling and laser tag locations.     This year Braden said he wanted to have a home movie night party.  I told him to let me know what the theme was going to be and after a few days passed, he said wanted an Egyptian themed party honoring the first female pharaoh Hatsheput.

Oooooookay then and how do you even spell that?

 

By the time I got all that information together I realized that I had to get the invites out that day.

I didn’t have time to do anything really unique with these other than use my mad Word skills and send out by email.

  invite

You know what you don’t get at a party store?

Egyptian themed decorations.

 I knew that I needed a focal point and decided on a large painting as a backdrop.

 I found this picture and decided I could take elements from it.

Egypt scene

Food buffet bars are really popular on Pinterest right now.  I went with a popcorn bar for the party.

popcorn bar

There were 3 types of popcorn plus toppings to choose from.

 

popcorn bar bowls

As for the table, thank all the Egypt mummies that we saved this playmobil set that he got years ago.

I used burlap as the tablecloth.  Being wrinkled made it sort of look like sand.

whole table view

 

tablescape

 

takehome bags

 

 

cake1

As for the cake, I started out wanting to do a king tut cake.  Then I thought I’d do a pyramid cake.

Honestly, when it came down to it, I sort of ran out of time and ended up dialing it in with a Nile river cake.

Not my best work but you know what?  That’s ok too.

I really had a fun time with this theme.   My other son has a June birthday.  I’m rooting for a carnival party……I guess we’ll see!

 

 

 

 

 

It Starts at Home

When I’m driving, I listen to today’s hits on the radio.  Some of them may be inappropriate and I change the station for the really bad ones. For the most part you can find me and the kids singing to Kesha, Kanye, and the occasional Katie Perry on any given day.  And my kids love music and I’m sorry, there’s nothing cuter than hearing your five year old kid sing Gangham style.

One day, when my older son was about 5, a song came on.

“I kissed a girl and I liked it”

I like that song.  It’s got a good beat.  Then I hear from the backseat:

“Now, that’s just gross”

“What’s gross?”

He replied “She’s singing about kissing a girl”

(Keep in mind he’s 5 and gender equality/ homosexuality were not on my list of lessons for that day.)

I reply “Yeah? So?”

“Well, that’s just gross”

“Why do you think that’s gross?”

“Well, it’s just UNNATURAL”

“What makes it unnatural?

“Well, that’s two girls kissing, and well, I don’t know but that just seems wrong”

 

And he doesn’t know.   He said it himself.  Though his perception of what “natural” is has had some growth in his 5 years (man/ woman, animal mating, whathaveyou) he doesn’t know.  He has not been taught.

 

“I guess you didn’t know that two people of the same gender could kiss.  And now you do.  Two girls can kiss, two boys can kiss, and a boy and girl can kiss.  It’s all natural because they are all people expressing their feelings and emotions, and that is natural to all humans”

He wasn’t totally buying into it and it ended up with him saying “Well, I don’t know about any of that, it just doesn’t seem right”

I followed up with how we, as a family, don’t judge others and accept whatever preference people have.

A few years pass by.

We’re driving in the car and notice a new restaurant being built.  My son says “What is that Chick-Fil-A place?”

“Oh, it’s a place that makes chicken sandwiches but we won’t be eating there because they don’t support equal rights for all people.

“What do you mean equal rights?”

“Well, they don’t support the idea of two men or two women being in love and getting married and your father and I do, so we won’t be supporting a company like that”

“Oh”

A year or so more passes by, and again, we’re in our car.  A new Chick-Fil-A has been built closer to our house and now my younger son (who is now 5) notices.

He asks “What is that restaurant?”

And before I could answer, his older brother who is now 10 says:

“Oh, that’s a chicken place that we won’t be eating at because they have problems with homosexuals getting married and I don’t know why.  What business is it of theirs who gets married?   They’re a chicken place.  They should just worry about chicken.”

It starts at home.   It starts with you.

________________________

This post dedicated to all of those who don’t think that an effort is made to educate the young about gay rights.

And for my friend @JeniSpin