2008 Wrap Up

OK, so I'm a little behind. But only according to the Western calendar. If you're going by the Chinese Calendar, it's still practically the New Year (and it's also 4707, but whatever).

Tell me I'm not the only person like this- every year around oh, December 10th or so, everything completely falls apart and I don't fully recover until at least mid-February. And sure enough here it's March 1st, and at last I feel like 2009 can begin.

Well almost.

I have a little notebook where I jot down notes for my blog , and I've got a few leftover musings and miscellany from 2008 that might actually be worth posting. (Some not so much: an open letter to Oprah, thoughts on the election, and something about journaling Doogie Howser style (?)). It's all pretty random and might not make sense in this format, but anyway, in an effort to tie up loose ends from last year, here's the final, semi-unedited, straight from The Notebook, 2008 Posts that never were (until now) . Oh, and I'm throwing in some pictures and a slide show, but that's strictly for the grandparents, and the creepy Internet stalkers.

First a few forgotten pics:

I could never think of a good caption for this picture. Some ideas:
Future Mensa Members or
"Hey dorks, stop playing chess and watch some TV will ya?"
I don't know-- nothing ever felt right. But I sure love this picture.

This is neither interesting nor funny, but I have to make a record of this moment or I know I will never believe it happened. This is a picture of the kids cleaning up WITHOUT being asked. I am not making this up.

Is this not the cutest tortilla you've ever see?

Quips and Quotes (I'm not sure where I was going with some of these, but here they are):

• The book I wish I thought of first (and the most entertaining thing I read in 2008): The Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life, by Amy Rosenthal. Memorable excerpt under the heading Brother:
  

  My brother, who grew up with three sisters, was I won't say how old when he finally realized that he didn't have to wrap the towel around his chest when he got out of the shower.

  If you like memoirs, read it and tell me what you think.
  
• How am I going to keep myself from making a big chocolate cake and eating the whole thing myself? (Yes, that's an actual thought I wrote down one day).
  
• Pet peeve of the month: Interviewing yourself. Do I like it when people ask themselves questions? No. Is it beyond annoying? Yes. Should everyone agree to stop doing it? YES.
• Why my hubby is way better than yours: When I apologized one night for burning our dinner he said, "That's the way I like it."
• Mia: "You know that song about 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun' blah blah blah whatever? I mean, what do they want to have fun doing? Eating cake or something?"
• My favorite conversation with Mia so far occurred one day after I mentioned to Mark that the car smelled because Sam had just had a stinky diaper in it. To which Mia replied: Are you sure it was Sam mom? Because I just went poop in the potty and it really stunk. I assured her it was most definitely Sam. No really, are you sure? Because I'm telling you I really stunk it up in there. (It still makes me laugh just typing this).
  

Here is an excerpt from a post from sometime in September about adjusting to life with a baby. It's called Checking Out of Loserville.

I've been in a kind of funk lately. Perhaps it's something to do with 4 bus stops a day and a baby that suddenly isn't cool with being left on the floor, or maybe it's hormonal, PPD, SAD, OCD...(I personally blame the media pundits, the Bush administration, and predatory lenders), but whatever the case, there's been a dark storm cloud hovering over Bardsleyland lately. But that all changed today. Why? I got dinner on the table. I'm not talking about the frozen chicken nuggets with mandarin oranges straight from the can kind of a dinner. I mean a steaming, homemade dinner with actual vegetables, on the table by 5:45. Never mind that my kids didn't even touch it and instead helped themselves to slices of bread. And so what if the feminist in me wanted to slam her head on the table because my self-esteem is seemingly directly proportional to my ability to put a meal on the table. I didn't care while my kids yelled and threw bread crusts at each other. I just sat there beaming and staring at that pot pie, feeling something strange-- oh yeah: accomplishment. I did something, and it was good. I didn't abandon it halfway through, it didn't dissolve into chaos, and I didn't end up in tears. Booyah- I'm back in the game.

I meant to post this in November on Black Friday:

Black Friday came a little early this year for two reasons. The first being traditional in the sense that I finally gave up on trying to find winter hats, gloves, jackets, etc for my kids at rock-bottom bargain prices by pouring over every ad and driving around to store after store after store. As I left Target I tried not to think about the total on my receipt and instead just told myself I was doing my part for the economy by paying full-price for things that my kids will promptly lose and/or grow out of. I hope Target thanks me.

The second reason is that our house was the scene of one of the ugliest, terrorizing mommy- tantrums of all time because my kids committed an unthinkable, heinous act: they woke up the baby. Now some of you are scratching your heads and thinking "wha?", but some of you are shaking your head and saying, "oh no they didn't!" Seriously, can I get a witness? Yes, they woke up the baby that I had just spent 45 minutes putting to sleep, so I could take a shower for the first time in 3 days. It got worse from there on out. It was BAD. Once I finished my shower, they were both forced to sit and listen to the screaming baby while I got ready. I then grabbed 2 conveniently empty storage bins from the garage and filled them with ALL the toys from each of their rooms. They were told that when I saw them behaving well, they would get back 1 toy at a time, and maybe by Christmas they would have all their toys back.

This was not well-received. In fact, here are some direct quotes from Mia that day:
I hate you. I just might kill you.
I still hate you and I probably will until you buy me a cheeseburger.

She never got that cheeseburger. It was a very black Friday indeed.

(They did eventually earn all their toys back, getting the very last ones on Christmas Eve).


And finally...The Christmas post I never got around to:
December 2008 can pretty much be summed up by travel, snow, illness, snow again, and more travel. Then there was a Stovall Reunion in Northern California that was not for the faint of heart, and neither is this ridiculously long slide show that you will probably not want to watch unless you are either directly related to us, or obsessed with us (and if so you might want to get help for that). It also includes pictures of our New Year's celebrations which involved bowling game where I scored a record 5 STRIKES IN A ROW. Not a bad way to end the year, if you ask me.

And with that I put 2008 to rest.

Finally.