* * *

When I left the parade I was really hoping that Claudia would find her costume on the school bus on the ride home, but when she came off of the bus empty handed I knew we were in trouble.

I started walking over so that I could ask the bus driver if he had found a black cheerleader uniform with a skull on it.

That is when Ian got off of the bus. Sobbing.

When a little girl gets off of the bus crying it is usually drama. When a boy gets off of the bus crying it is usually an injury.

But he was crying about his costume ripping and custodians and lost and found and the school being locked. It was clear that I would be buying two new costumes that evening. I told the boy that everything would be okay and I wasn’t mad and I would address his issue right after I talked to the bus driver.

Claudia’s costume wasn’t on the bus either. Even four days later it would seem that the costume has been sucked into the ether, probably the same place that has claimed single socks, guitar picks and hair ties since the beginning of time.

And this is how I found myself driving to the party store in rush hour DC traffic on the Friday afternoon before Halloween.

I didn’t want to go to the stupid party store on October 28th at 4:30 in the afternoon. I thought I knew what awaited me if I ever made it to Party City before it closed. I figured it would be crowded and picked over.

I threatened the children in the car. You will take what we can find. We might not find the exact same costume. It will be crowded. You have to stay with me.

This was met with crying and whining. Which was in turn met with me losing my shit. There will be no whining and no crying from this moment forward. Is this what you think I want to do with my Friday evening? Go to the party store where I can spend MORE money on costumes that I neither lost nor ruined? I am trying to fix your problems!

Then I actually turned around in my seat like Dads do on tv shows from the ’70s. AND IF THERE IS ANY MORE CRYING BEFORE WE GET HOME NOBODY IS GOING TO GO TRICK OR TREATING SO YOU WON’T NEED COSTUMES ANYWAY.

It was pretty quiet the rest of the 38 minutes it took to drive like six miles.

I underestimated the chaos of the party store.

Fortunately, I also underestimated my children who were able to make fast decisions under duress and we got out of there in less that 15 minutes with girly pirate costume and a red ninja costume.

Halloween was saved.

I am sick of writing about Halloween costumes so I won’t even get in to how we had a party to go to on Saturday night and I wouldn’t let them dress in the new costumes for obvious reasons until Monday night and there were new levels of teen angst and drama reached by a 7 year old girl who wouldn’t wear a sweater because it looked better on the model on the website.

*deep breaths*

Nor will I go into depth about how much she enjoyed it when the costume she finally agreed to involved heavy eyeshadow, lipstick and teasing her hair.

What I do want to say is this – no matter what you think, your mother probably went WAY out of her way to make your life a better place and if she is still around you should call her right now and thank her. (Thanks Mom!) I know for a fact that my mom did all sorts of crazy things for me and I probably yelled at her a bunch while she was doing things to help make my life slightly better. I accept this as my payback. I just really, really hope that it isn’t just payback for second grade and that my recent parenting heroics (if you think it was bad parenting, just don’t tell me unless you want to drive me to the mental hospital)  make up for that whole teenage mess too.

This year Claudia was to be a cheerless leader and Ian was going to be a stealth ninja.

Did you notice the past tense even though Halloween is still two days away?

Yesterday was the “Fall Spirit Parade” (see: Halloween parties for the politically correct) at the Goon Squad’s elementary school.  Technically they were supposed to dress as storybook characters, but after three years we have learned how to work around this system. First you buy the costume, then you find a book with a ninja in it.

I am such a good role model.

Okay, I’m a terrible role model but I was so sick of fighting with them AND finding two costumes that I thought we could make this happen. You have to choose your battles and this year it was between the Halloween costume fight or the homework and chewing with your mouth closed fights.

I just said yes. You can wear that to school. Just don’t take any weapons.

Back to the Fall Spirit Parade! It is a huge parade around the field with every kid in the school and 70% of the moms in the neighborhood. The parade is insane. It is like a a 45 minute long Lollapalooza except the music sucks and most of us weren’t high or drunk. I know I was painfully sober. At our school we have a party in the classroom with crafts and games and treats and then everyone changes into their costume and goes outside for the main event.

As a parent of more than one child I have to volunteer in more than one class. My usual plan is to run back and forth between classrooms the entire time. It is stressful, but it usually gets me out of being in charge of the crafts and I loathe doing crafts. So yesterday as I make my way back in to my daughter’s classroom she is walking out of the changing area and saying “I forgot to bring in the main part of my costume.” We look in her costume bag. Is isn’t there. We look in her other bags.

Her costume is nowhere to be found.

She starts tearing up.

“Don’t worry.” I say “We’ll figure out something.”

She is starting to really cry. I know it is embarrassing to cry in front of your friends.

“Okay, let’s just take the pom poms.” (pom pons? whatever)

She shakes her head no. Then she says “IT ISN’T FAIR!”

I said. “Hey! Don’t yell at me. I didn’t lose your costume.”

But then I felt bad. I knew she was looking forward to this and I knew it was devastating for her. This is something they look forward to all year.

I offered to run home and see if it was there. But I could see her, feeling like a mess, embarrassed that she was so upset, but really really upset. So I asked if she wanted to run home with me to see if we could find it.

Keep in mind, this is 20 minutes until the party starts.

This post is already really really long, so I will just make you a list of the things that happened next.

• couldn’t find her teacher
• cleared the plan with another teacher
• found teacher
• explained plan to teacher
• signed her out of school
• ran to car
• got car out of very, very, very tight parking spot with daughter yelling “WE WILL NEVER MAKE IT ON TIME!!!”
• drove home
• ran inside and up the stairs

The costume wasn’t there.

Her costume wasn’t anywhere. My best guess was that is somehow ended up on the bus.

The following are ideas I came up with and were all rejected in the five minutes after the shocking discovery that the Tinkerbell costume from three years ago wasn’t long enough (all of it involving screaming and crying): Harry Potter, Hermione, a stormtrooper, a Tae Kwon Do student, a football player, a jedi, Princess Leia, a baby.

Desperate I scanned the closets (also where I found the other eight options) and saw the flower girl dresses.

“Do you want to wear a flower girl dress?” I asked.

“Which one?” she said.

“I don’t care,” I probably actually yelled “How about the green one.”

As I am putting on the flower girl dress from her Aunt and Uncle’s wedding over a year ago I notice the size of the dress which is a 4.

Claudia wears a seven or an eight. Thankfully she is tall and skinny and it zipped up even over the long sleeved white shirt we had to put on under it because it was 42 degrees out and windy.

She looked beautiful.

“Okay.” she said.

“Then run.” I said.

And we ran. And we drove and she cried “We’ll never make it on time! This isn’t fair! You don’t even like me!”

I remained calm-ish. I explained that if I didn’t like her I wouldn’t be doing any of this and how far out of my way I had gone for her and that I should be returning client phone calls but instead I was driving her back to the spirit parade which isn’t even that fun for moms.

I also told her that if she gave me anymore lip there would be no trick or treating on Monday.

We parked the car and ran – RAN – out to the field where the festivities were just starting. “We’ll never find my class.” she said very careful not to whine or cry.

But we did. We found her class easily. She almost started to cry again until her best friend turned around and said “She looks pretty.” and then “Claudia, sit here.” and then she made some space.

And all was well.

For about an hour and a half.

(The Halloween Costume Debacle – Part II to follow.)

I told this to my children this afternoon.

I told them this one, because it is true and two, because I was trying to think of something positive to say.

The kids didn’t have school today because of all of the flooding. When my neighbor wanted to take my kids on a walk to McDonalds I nearly lost my mind. “IT ISN’T SAFE!” I yelled at everyone.

Of course my neighbor didn’t know that one of our local bloggers lost her son yesterday to the storm when he was swept away by the fast rising water in a creek. My kids didn’t know it either, but I ended up telling them when I was trying to explain why I was the meanest mom in the neighborhood.

I was trying to be positive as I was driving them to McDonalds in a fit of guilt for denying them everything and also ignoring them while finishing up a project for work this morning. I told them that I liked winter because there were no mosquitos to bite me.

Claudia said she was looking forward to winter because of snow days and Christmas.

Ian said he was looking forward to hibernating.

I giggled instead of telling him that humans don’t hibernate, but it was been a long summer and hibernation kind of sounds wonderful.

But hibernation plans certainly explain his eating habits lately. And mine.

I need to be an optimist. At least an optimistic realist. If I sit around and worry about all of the bad things that could happen in life I will miss the living part. I’m still not going to let my kids walk around in dangerous conditions, but I suppose I could try to handle it more gracefully should the opportunity rise again.

The rain will go away eventually and so will the mosquitoes. For now, I will enjoy the fall (if it ever starts acting like fall instead of Armageddon) and the football that goes along with it.

* * *

All of my sympathies go out to Anna and her family in their time of loss.

She is seven years old.

What on earth have I created?

I will take partial credit.

The Goon Squad’s birth announcement featured a picture of the twins wearing Misfit’s onesies.

Then there was this.

Then I praised her when she wanted these.

But none of those are sexy.

Maybe if the child in the photograph wasn’t wearing all that eyeliner and lipstick.

Or if she didn’t have a red fishnet midriff.

Then again, knowing my daughter, she probably just wants the boots.

I like giving my kids choices and I am the fool that handed them a catalog and said “pick whatever you want to be for Halloween” but this isn’t what I was expecting.

I’m feeling panicky about my daughter becoming a teenager. About her liking boys. About her *deep breath* dating. I don’t know if I am read for all of that. I know she is only in second grade, but the first seven years went by so fast I know that I will blink and she will be fourteen and she will mean it. Maybe this is why parents get all weepy about back to school. Maybe it is because it is another sign that your baby is growing up and things are changing so fast.

But probably I should just shut up and be happy that she didn’t want to be the bloody nurse.

I have been in the shower almost long enough so that my hair is wet enough to put in the shampoo.

I wonder what he could have done to make her so angry in such a short period of time.

The screaming comes in the door.

“What happened?”

“IAN!” she gives her standard answer.

“Ian what?” I give my standard reply.

“He tried to choke me!”

“No I didn’t!”

Awesome. Now all three of us are in my bathroom.

“I HATE MY LIFE!” she yells. “YOU NEVER EVEN LOVED ME!”

I have been in the shower for three minutes. The seven years right before that I spent with her.

“I have always loved you.” I say.

And they exit.

* * *

I am standing in the shower and I yell “DAMMIT!”

Because I forgot to mow the lawn before I took a shower. Now I will get all smelly and have to bathe again before my fantasy football draft.

Who am I kidding? It is an online draft and the last time I got to take two showers in one day was… I can’t even remember the last time I took two showers in one day. Probably the last time a kid threw up on me.

* * *

I am standing in the shower rinsing the conditioner out of my hair.

“Mom?”

He is back.

“Do you think whipped cream would be good in a shake?” he asks.

“Sure. Wait! What are you doing?”

“I am writing a recipe for a shake.”

He is planning this evening’s milk shake competition versus his father.

“Do we have whipped cream?”

“Yes.”

“Where?” I can’t remember buying whipped cream since we had pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving. It is August.

“In the fridge.”

“Check the date on it.”

I hear footsteps run down the hall.

I hear footsteps running back.

“It is sour cream.”

“Yeah, that would taste bad in a shake.”

* * *

I am getting out of the shower. It is quiet. Ten minutes have lapsed since I got in the shower.

I love my children.

I cannot wait for school to start on Tuesday.

This is how I happened to see a person Irish dancing a la Riverdance to White Zombie.

By a person, I mean, my daughter. The same daughter who earlier in the day told me that Alice in Chains reminded her of spaghetti.

And then I was certain I had seen everything.

Until I turned my back on them to type this.

When I spun back around there was some sort of Fifth of Beethoven striptease happening on my coffee table.

This was not what Walter Murphy OR Ludwig Van had in mind.

Ah, what do I know. Maybe it was what he envisioned. Maybe that is why he always looks so pissy. Nobody likes it when people dance on their coffee table.

I admit, however, to having an ulterior motive.

I am going to call them Cherie and Leta and make them form a band with the Joan Jett Barbie White bought me for my birthday.

She don't give a damn about her reputation.

This is going to rule.

I couldn’t do it again this year. We had a big party last year. This year they each have something like 28 children in their classes. If we invited them all that is 56 kids, plus all of the extra kids that come because people automatically assume siblings are invited. It was out of the question. Just because I had two babies on the same day doesn’t mean I want 65 kids in my house.

No big deal. My kids are reasonable (ish). They understood and agreed on the small party. Each child got to pick an activity and three friends. Easy peasy.

Ian wanted to take his friends bowling. Claudia wanted to take her friends for a manicure and pedicure. No problem.

Or so one would think.

Claudia is in a multi aged 1/2 class. There are four first grade girls including herself and they have been pretty tight. This was a no brainer. Ian has been tinkering with his guest list. Some days he doesn’t have any friends and other days he has too many friends. He will make up his mind eventually.

BUT.

Their birthday is today. We can’t have their party this weekend because of previous engagements. We were going to have it last weekend except before I invited everyone one of Claudia’s three announced her birthday party was that Saturday. I tried to make it Sunday, but oops! That was Mother’s Day. Try again. Did I mention we have a t-nall game every weekend that we have to work around?

We elected to postpone the parties for two weeks. The kids were cool with this. It was a birthday miracle!

But then Claudia got in a fight with one of her three. One of them wanted to play with the second graders and one of them didn’t.

Now they can’t be friends.

Which blows because I already told that mom that her daughter was invited, and now what? Do I go to her and say “Sorry, your kid was invited, but since she wanted to play with the second graders my ageist daughter won’t be friends with her anymore. Suck it.” and then in a week when they make up I have to go and embarrass myself again?

Because you just know they will make up. But Claudia is insisting that she cannot be invited.

And don’t even get me started on the boy. This week is stable but there is some sort of bizarre friendship triangle going on with that one. He fights with one of his friends like they are an old married couple.

Between the date changes and the time changes and guest lists I might lose my mind.

By the time we work this all out it will be their 8th birthday.

Some people say I have to have a birthday party. I say bullshit. I don’t have to have anything. Why would I spend the time, energy and money to throw a party for my kids and invite people that they don’t like.

And when did seven become one of the teenage years?

It also implies that I let him watch "The Simpsons waaaaay too much.

This card also came with what I would call a coupon, but my son insists is a credit card, that gets me “one free set the table’.

Sweet, right?

When dinner time rolled around I called him inside from playing.

“Yes,” I said “I have a coupon here that entitles me to a free setting of the table. I would like to use this now.”

He smiles at me.

Then he says “Sure, can I see some I.D.?”

Normally I don’t mind getting I.D.ed at all. I generally it flattering or occasionally a good security measure, but in this case I was caught off guard.

“Um, I don’t have my wallet on me.”

“I can wait.” he said.

So I went back to my bedroom and got my wallet out of my purse. I brought my wallet in to the dining room where he was waiting patiently. I took my drivers license out of my wallet and handed it to my six year old son.

He studied the identification.

Then he looked at me.

“Okay.” he said, and then he started with the napkins.

* * *

How was your Mother’s Day?

I still do.

Part of it is that I am an honest person and I try not to do things that I wouldn’t tell people about.

More of it is that I am too lazy to remember my lies and cover up is taxing.

So – if I didn’t lie to my parents why do I constantly find myself lying to my children?

I always told myself that I wouldn’t lie to my kids, and as an oversharer I have already told them how babies are made and about caesarian sections and miscarriage and suicide and all sorts of inappropriate things. I have told them why I don’t believe in creationism. I have told them about my D in pre-algebra. I told them that I got a bus referral for yelling out the window (I was totally framed). We’ve discussed exorcism and how ghosts and aliens are probably real but house elves are fictional. I told them the literal meaning of the word “shit” and why calling somebody a douchebag isn’t nice. I told them who would be taking care of them if their father and I both die.  I even told them what N.W.A stood for.

I don’t mean to say that we don’t have any secrets. They don’t know my pin number or where I stash the good candy. They don’t know I used to smoke cigarettes.

But one time Claudia asked me how far a man had to put his penis in a woman’s vagina to make a baby and I answered it as honestly as I could.

(You are welcome other kids on the bus.)

So why am I repeatedly forced to lie to them and cover up about stupid shit like the Easter Bunny?

The Tooth Fairy. Santa Claus. Fucking Leprechauns.

Why must I sneak around and hide plastic eggs? Why do I have to go to four stores to search for Easter baskets?

I don’t even believe in the resurrection. Why do I have to be liar about it?

Oh right. Because of the other kids in the neighborhood.

Or, because, like the lady in the craft store told me “Because it so wonderful when they find out the truth and they don’t know you know they know and they think they have something on you.”

Yes, deception is so charming, lady.

I hate craft stores.

And I hate lying to my children.

So what is the age of enlightenment? Six? Eight? Ten? Give it up. They are almost seven. Can I tell them now?

Because honestly, if I have to make up another story about Santa and time travel or have another long drawn discussion about how big the tooth fairy is (she was just stalling so she didn’t have to go to sleep), if I have to explain how the leprechaun isn’t going to trash him bedroom if he doesn’t QUICK! use the box that all of the operas are in while we paint behind the shelf to make a trap and console him while he cries because he knows leprechauns are real because the toilet water was green in kindergarten, I might snap.

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