Naturally I am busy this time of year. When I came in last night, I didn’t stop to use the bathroom until 11 p.m. But the really busy girl at my house is my daughter. She has fantastic activities during her 2 1/2-week school break, including art camp (yesterday and tomorrow) and, even better, riding camp.
Unfortunately for someone (me? her? not sure), we’re having to invoke the sort of bastardized mailbox rule-slash-”dance with the one what brung ya” of kiddie activity planning. After the Husband’s visit to the stables this afternoon to watch the girl ride, it seems that her time might be happier spent doing horse camp every day instead of any art camp at all, but I promised art camp first and paid for it first and so, tomorrow, to art camp in the afternoon she will go.
But she’d rather be riding.
But either way, I wish I could live her school break. Back in my day we just visited grandparents and hung around (and read and colored and drew and watched Brady Bunch) the whole time.
On a completely unrelated note, are you still shopping for kids? You need this book and, if you haven’t already gotten it, a copy of Little Pea.
Then, you can sit back and envy me while I wait for a little pea.
Bide your time with Will Hillenbrand’s art processes. Your kids will like it, too.
On a second completely unrelated note, I have learned that if you act like a boy in the workplace, they will eventually treat you like a boy. Sorta. I got schnookered into bringing dirty grits* for our building Christmas party (someone else in my branch signed me up for this honor but prefaced it with “we’ll each make a crockpot of your grits or if you don’t want to, I can do it all myself” followed by a plaintive sighhhhhhhh and missing only the teenage girl eyeroll). I hate hauling out my crockpot and I hate cleaning it up afterwards even more.
(Dried formerly wet grits stick worse than grout. I should have suggested that to this gal.)
If I bring the crockpot to work and plug it in where told and then completely ignore its presence, boy-style, it will eventually be returned to my office, completely washed and free of grit-grout.
If I am called to someone else’s office to sign something or to drop by and give cash for something, I ignore the request because that person will eventually come to me. Girls go running (because we are kind and helpful, see, see?) and boys wait because eventually the girls will come running.
Beware, though, I think boy-style works only in the workplace. If you try this at home, your crockpot might still be sitting there a month from now, at which point I suggest you chuck it or bring it to my office, where it will eventually be washed by someone who is not me.
* Large stockpot of grits. Add butter. Add diced onion and finely diced garlic that’s been sauteed in butter/olive oil. Add one big block of velveeta (I know it’s awful) and one pound of sharp white cheddar cheese, or you could just add various cheeses of your choice. Add at least a pound of andouille or Conecuh County sausage that you’ve sliced into wee coins and already cooked up (I just use the saute pan from the onions/garlic). Add two cans of Rotel tomatoes (whatever hotness you choose) and you’ll have to decide for yourself whether or not to add the liquid in them, too, based on how soupy yer grits are.
Stir. If you’ve added lots of rotel liquid, the dirty grits will be orangey pinkish. Note that minions in your office building might peer down into your steamy crockpot o’grits with great distaste and ask “What is thaaaat?” and that you will cringe in embarassment because you made it after your coworker forced you to do so when you could have just given cash like everyone else.
(Also known as: Monday morning, for me.)
