The Magic of Christmas

I was shopping at Marshall's with Anna last week in between an appointment with her therapist and her dentist appointment when I saw a certain kind of cat bed I'd been looking to buy for Lola. 

The dogs were getting new collars from Santa, so I wanted Lola's bed to be from Santa. Since Anna still believed in Santa, and I didn't want to ruin it for her, I said, "Ooh! I mentioned to Santa that I wanted one of these for Lola. Maybe I'll just buy it and he can pay me back."

Anna seemed to smirk, but it was hard to tell with her mask on, so I said, "Are you laughing?"

She said, "No."

"What are you thinking?" I asked.

"Nothing," she said, but she was clearly thinking something.

I wanted to see her expression. Did she (finally) not believe in Santa anymore? So, I said, "I need to see your face." I pulled her mask down a little. She said, "You can't do that. We have to have our masks on."

"Okay, then tell me what you're thinking?" I said.

She smirked more. I could tell even without seeing her mouth.

I ventured, "Do you not believe in Santa anymore?"

She kind of rolled her eyes.

I began, "This is a very exciting moment, Anna. If you no longer believe in Santa, you get to become Santa for others! It's a lovely way to celebrate the birth of Jesus.

She rolled her eyes a little more, as I launched into my "Magic of Christmas" Spiel.

We continued shopping, and after a little while, I said, "You know... Dad and I were wondering how long it would take you to figure it out. We were surprised you hadn't.

"Well," she said, "I've known for a couple years, but you were having so much fun, I didn't want to ruin it for you."

Ally and Moe

Poor Ally had a very sad time a couple weeks ago. 

Her beloved Moe died. She has known Moe for a few years. He used to live with our cottage neighbors. She worried about him and wanted to give him a more ideal home, s

o she adopted him in July after asking for a new fish tank for her birthday. 

She would talk to Moe every night when she went to bed. 

He was a great quarantine buddy.

We've gotten buddies for Moe who have died, and she handled that just fine, 

but when Moe died she was devastated. 

She didn't want any more fish for a while.

After a while she decided she was ready.

She decided she wanted to rescue more feeder fish because Moe had originally been a feeder fish.

We picked out four beautiful, unique fish and had a fun time naming them.

 

Quinceanero

My kind, good-humored, generous Kate. She had her fifteenth birthday yesterday. At one point, Dave made a joke about her quinceanero. It got a good eye roll, so for the last month Dave and I had continued to refer to her upcoming birthday as her quinceanero. 

The morning began with homemade cinnamon rolls and a special sweatshirt with a cat pocket.

Then the twins helped me get ready to decorate her cake to perfection.

After a few more gifts, including a Taylor Swift cardigan which stole the show,

we got to my favorite part.

A super gaudy quinceanero cake.

Just look at her reaction.

It cracked me up to no end. I could not stop laughing.

She's such a good kid... I mean, she puts up with me!

Fifteen!!

Here's what a Covid birthday party looks like. 

Kate wanted nothing more for her birthday than to hang out with her friends. (She's seen a couple friends in person, usually outside, but she wanted to be able to see a bunch at once.) We made that happen.

A fellow North Shore mom runs a business where she does cooking classes. She did a private class for Kate and her friends. They made cinnamon rolls on Zoom together.

After the class, I made them sing to her (and I learned why group singing over Zoom isn't a thing), she blew out her candle, and they all enjoyed cinnamon rolls together.

 

One quick rant

 While I'm on a roll here...

Don't tell me that not all people who vote for Trump are racist or that everyone votes for different reasons.

I get it, maybe didn’t vote with the purpose of keeping black people down, but his overt racism wasn’t a deal breaker. 

His overt misogyny wasn’t a deal breaker. 

Putting asylum seekers back in harm’s way and separating them from their children wasn’t a deal breaker. 

Yes, they maybe had their own reasons, but they put those ahead of all these people who have been suffering because of Trump’s behavior. 

And that’s sad. It's truly disturbing and sad.

This @#%& election

Wow. I knew going in that this election was going to be a long haul because of all the mail-in ballots that need to be counted, but I didn't think of how hard the time we are waiting would be.

I think it hit me last night how incredibly disappointed I am that it's such a close race. I think there was always a part of me that thought "most" people had to see how horrible Trump was, and that it couldn't possibly be a close race. 

I spent years, probably mid 2017 to early 2020, believing that even the people who voted for him had to now realize what a horrible mistake they'd made. As the election drew closer, I realized a good number of people still supported him, but... it couldn't be close to half of the people...

So, when the results started coming in, and states were turning red, it was a harsh reality check. It made me so sad.

I mean...

The racist comments against black people. (And the national unrest)

    "There are good people on both sides." About white supremacists.

The racist comments against Mexicans. (And all the asylum seekers put in harm's way and children torn from their parents.)

    "Mexicans are drug dealers, criminals, rapists."

The racist comments against Asians.

    The countless times he's referred to Covid as "The China virus."

The misogyny (And so many assault accusations.)

    "I grab them by the pussy."

His denial of Covid and the fact that over 230,000 Americans have died.

    "I don't wear a mask like him... and he shows up with the biggest mask I've ever seen."

His outright lies after lies after lies! (And, how he paid less in taxes than a teacher.)

    "...prepaid tens of millions of dollars. I prepaid my taxes."

Yeah, okay, so he's a bad man. I've come to terms with that. 

But, how can so many people still back him? How can racism not be a deal breaker? How can a tape of him discussing assaulting women not be a deal breaker? Are people really okay with all his tweets, his disgusting behavior, his continual lies?

If you vote for him, aren't you okaying this? Aren't people better than that?

Last night, I went to bed early. I couldn't handle it.

I found Anna sitting on my bed with tears in her eyes. She said, “I don’t understand. I’m just so sad about people. How can people vote for him? He’s so awful. He should have gotten just one vote...from his mother!”

Amen, sweet girl. We share the same sensitive, opinionated soul.

The next day...

Clavicle

We debated for months whether or not to sign Luke up for fall soccer in this crazy time. Was it irresponsible?

We finally decided to try it. It would be outside with masks worn by all players and spectators on the sidelines.

Luke went to a practice and his first game, and he was so happy. Playing sports is one of his very favorite things to do. He hasn't been able to do much for six months. He had another practice, and then Saturday he had his second game. 

Because of a shortage of players, he was put on a team with fellow 10-year-olds, as usual, but also 11-year-olds. At only 54 lbs, he was, once again, the smallest player, but he was significantly smaller than many of the players. In the second half of the game, he collided with a much larger player and then that player landed on top of him.

He didn't get up right away. When he finally did, he was very pale and shaky. We thought he had gotten a concussion. His head was scraped and had mud and grass on it. He said everything hurt, but especially his collar bone. I looked down and saw a large lump on the bone. I knew right away it was broken.

Dave took him for x-rays since they only allow one parent to accompany kids, and sure enough, it was broken.

He had a couple really rough days. He was in a lot of pain.

But, so many people brought him things to cheer him/us up. Donuts, dill dip and pretzels, a Roblox gift card and treats, Legos...

And he got to attend school the next day he had it, since he got three days of rest.

Luke had been saying it sounded worse when we say “Clavicle” instead of collar bone. I thought this was a funny comment.

I told it to the mom of one of his friends, P, when they stopped over to drop a bag of treats, and she told me about this conversation between her and P. 

Friend's mom - "P, let’s do something for Luke. He broke his clavicle."

P - "Oh, no!!! Is he dead???"

I guess clavicle does sound worse!

So happy

I was telling the kids' piano teacher that this was the first year I didn't cry when I dropped them off for the first day of school, "...because I was just so happy they could be back."

Luke interjected, "Well, you were really so happy to finally have some time alone!"

I mean, it's not *not* true.

Getting ready for the first day

 Ally: Do I have to take a shower?

Me: Well, tomorrow is the first day of school.

Ally: Yeah, but I don't smell, and even if I did, no one can get close enough to me to notice.

Valid point. I let her skip the shower.

Yet another silver lining of Covid.

First Day

 Kate, 9th grade at Nicolet, entirely virtual

Anna, 7th grade, Tuesday/Thursday in person, Monday/Wednesday virtual

Luke, 5th grade, Tuesday/Thursday in person, Monday/Wednesday virtual

Ally, 5th grade, Tuesday/Thursday in person, Monday/Wednesday virtual

That time when...

There was this one time when 

Dave decided to cook bacon on a "foil boat" on the grill...

in the rain...

and we used two fire extinguishers...

and still ended up spending a couple hours washing smoke stains off the walls.

Psychic Twin Powers

Luke was testing out whether he and Ally had psychic twin powers. 

Such an environmentalist

It's BLT time again!

Grabbing the bacon out of the pan, I asked Ally to put paper towel down for me. She put down one layer, and I said, "We actually need two layers." 

I filled up the plate with bacon and asked her for two more pieces of paper towel for another layer. She put down two pieces of paper towel, but they were the small kind, so it was one layer. I said, "I actually mean two layers, not two pieces."

She took more pieces, rolling her eyes a little at me, and muttered, "I feel bad for the environment right now."

Come on! We recycle, we compost, we even use cloth napkins, for Pete's Sake, but this is bacon grease!

She seemed to forget about the environment, however, by the time her sandwich was ready.

Scrappy-Mulligan-Lola

Mulligan was scheduled for his neutering yesterday morning. I dropped him off around 8:30 and came back to pick him up at 4:00.

When I came in, a woman asked me to sit down so she could talk to me. I got really worried that something had happened to him. I waited for 10 minutes with my heart in my stomach.

Then a different volunteer came and handed me him in his carrier. I looked in, and he looked fine. I said, "Is he okay? Did he do all right?"

The volunteer replied, "Yes, he's a little shy, but the surgery went well."

I said the other woman had wanted to talk to me. I asked if I should wait. He said it was fine, I could go home. I took him in the car and snuggled him and then drove him home.

He seemed to be in a lot of pain, so I checked his incision. There was a huge line down the center of his abdomen and a small one to the side.

I thought, Those aren't neutering incisions! I panicked. Did they accidentally cut him wrong? Oh my goodness, that must be why they wanted to talk to me! I thought of the stories of someone going in to have their right leg amputated and having their left accidentally taken by mistake.

I was confused. I was worried.

I grabbed the paperwork they'd given me and went upstairs. The first page said, 8 weeks old, Neutered, Domestic SH, Black Cat. I was so upset. What was going on.

Then I found something that said Mulligan, Female (spayed)

I called Dave at work. I asked him to FaceTime and showed him the incision. I asked, "Do you think they cut him wrong, or do you think he's a girl!?"  He told me to try calling MADACC.

I explained to the staff there what happened, they said, "Oh, let me look... Yep, it's a girl."

I asked, "Was I confused this whole time? Or did they just figure it out when they went to neuter him?"

They were like, "They just figured it out."

Okay.

I cried. My sweet little kitty boy was a girl. We spent a month thinking of all the things he did ask being  spunky boy things. We named him a boy's name.

I braced myself for the kids' reaction and told them. They all laughed. They called their friends to tell them the funny story.

Kate said, "I want to call her Lola."

I said, "Ugh! No. I hate that name. Every time I hear it, I think of a song about a woman named Lolathat was actually a man... OH! Oh, my gosh. That's PERFECT! Lola, it is!"

Mulligan

I've always thought it would be awesome to foster baby animals. I mean, kitties and puppies... what could be better?

Dave finally agreed to let us (partially due to a Google Slide presentation from Kate, and partially due to him becoming beat down being the only one who didn't want to).

We signed up to be fosters, and on Friday, July 10 while Luke was getting x-rays to get his cast changed out for a splint, I got an email looking for foster families for a few groups of kittens.

I replied that we were free, and we were matched with one little boy. When they first took him out to show me him, I thought, "Yikes! What is THAT?"

Instead of the cuddly kitty I was expecting, what was there was a really beat up 4-week-old kitten with matted fur and an eye infection. He looked rough.

I brought him home and everyone oohed and ahhed about how cute he was, but he wasn't.

I gave him a bath, which helped slightly. We called him Scrappy. After a few days of medicine, eye drops, and regular feedings, he started to look more like a cute little kitten. 

He figured out his litter box the first day (after peeing once on Dave), got used to car rides to and from the cottage, and bonded with Riley. They have an agreement that he can bite her tail or legs and jump on her face, and Riley walks away when she's had too much.

Dave told us we could keep him. The kids and I were actually okay with fostering and returning, but he said, "We're going to have to get a cat eventually. This one seems good." Such passion, that guy.

Since we were given permission to do so, we fell in love. We changed his name to Hercules Mulligan, a spy in the Hamilton musical, and call him Mulligan.