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Sir Luke surprised me this morning. I wasn’t drilling, just probing, assessing how much these sweet beans know. What do yellow and red make? “Orange,” he said without looking up. Blue and yellow? “Green.” Scoop of vanilla, scoop of chocolate, don’t waste my time, lady. Red and blue. “Yawn.”

Only he said “purple” in lieu of “yawn.” When I asked Abigail the same questions, she looked up at me. Guilty. “I don’t know my colors as well as I should,” she said in a way that kind of broke my heart. It doesn’t matter if she knows them or not, that’s not what hit me. It was that tone of apology. I know how hard that is, to admit—and make no mistake, that’s what it feels like, a huge confession, strung up in a net of shame—what we don’t know, what we’ve done or got wrong. I wonder now, only briefly really, if it’s a learned tone, something she hears in my voice when I speak with Phil. I doubt it, not because the tone isn’t knit into my sentences—it has to be, and even now I can hear it in my own mother’s voice, a voice I can replay from childhood—but because I’ve seen it everywhere for as long as I can remember. The problem is, I associate that apologetic choke of words with “knowing better,” an understanding between right and wrong. I don’t want my children to associate not knowing something with degradation.

I kiss her on the crown of her head, smelling her shampooed hair, a floral clean. Then I crouch to meet her eyes and explain, “Don’t ever feel bad about not knowing something, okay? I don’t know a gazillion million things! Know what you should feel good about? Wanting to learn, asking questions, and being curious. It’s one of the things I love most about you. Never stop asking questions.”

“Mama,” she asks, now smiling and full of sass, “Are we going to learn our colors or what?” Her hands are now on her hips. She is my rainbow.

Vietnamese Cinnamon, a ladel, chili bowls with handles for All You Can Handle Chili, and a book of chili potions.

A Man Gift of Chili without the Chili. Would’ve included dried Ancho if I had more time.

Madeline Minds Her Manners & Madeleine cookies. We’ll be getting our bake on soon.

I don’t care what they say. You can judge a book by its cover. Or at least a gift by its wrap. I actually couldn’t care less what’s inside a package. I love the foreplay of an unopened gift, sitting beneath a pine tree, its silver-blue needles glittering their way down. I adore the build, not just “up to Christmas” but in everything. The planning phase, the infatuation, the idea. I love, and always have loved, the idea more than the outcome, with the exception of my children and chocolate chip cookies.

It’s art. Let me say at least that, too. You have a big event, a date, a reunion, you pen in a hair blowout and a makeup application. Meanwhile, no one gives a shit what you’re wearing, if you chose browns and neutrals over the plummy smoky eye because they’re too concerned with their own impressions. Did anyone notice the bald spot, the weight gain, the fourth husband? And, you know what? Yes, and no. They noticed, but they really don’t care, and neither should you. Still, you’ve got a valid point: sometimes, you enjoy the “getting ready” more than the ready.

I’ve been obsessed lately with makeup. I apply it. Phil tells me I don’t need it, that I’m a beautiful woman without any of it, and wearing it makes people think that I have to wear it, that I’m hiding in it. This, for the record, goes into one ear, and out into a blog, because I don’t give two shades of shadow. Women really don’t dress or success for a man. We may acquiesce, second-guess, and—under the influence of alcohol—undress; nonetheless, come morning, we suppress all that we transgressed. And none of it really mattered much anyhow.

Makeup really isn’t about pretty. It’s art. I love makeup for the effects, for the fashion of it, for the trends and the blends. No, I’m not going to surround one eye with a TRIANGLE of Mongolian Yellow shadow any more than I’m going to sport an asymmetrical bob. But, man, there’s just something to be said for pretty packaging. Last year I went “Crafty Christmas” [think newspaper wrapping, burlap, and ephemera, beneath the tree]:

This year, I’m embracing the Swiss Snow Chalet. Think Nordic and overhanging eaves. Also think, “Red, White, and Paper Bags.”

I’m wrapping everything. One book at a time. I’ve sworn off buying utter crap for Christmas and am only purchasing educational toys, books, and toys emphasizing gross and fine motor skills (from bicycles to Montessori trinomial cubes).

I’m also trying to mostly give gifts tied to a specific experience, so it’s not about “the toy” and it’s more about “the event” and time spent together as a family:

- Something train-related for Lucas, with “tickets” to train museum
- Abigail wants swimming lessons, gymnastic class, and a “heavy duty art class.” That, quote, by the by, best all year. So, why not give hints to each lesson? A bathing suit, leotard, and paint palette.
- Trip to feed the Giraffes at the zoo with a stuffed giraffe or giraffe puzzle.
- Planetarium “tickets” with some solar system type toy
- Tea cups, good for an afternoon of Tea
- Monkeys in a box? Print out a bunch of them? For a day at Monkey Joes [A bouncy house destination]
- Baking Gift – wrap muffin pans or mix, and make it a special baking event just for each of them, one on one
- Fishing & Seashore themed gift (have the books)
- Family Pirate Picnic at Pirate’s Cove (bought a Thomas the Train Pirate’s Cove Pirate Ship)
 

It will all go by too fast. The wrapping paper stuffed into a garbage bag, piles of toys to be put away, a mention of who got to open more gifts than the other (despite it being even), then the cleaning, the company, and thankfully, the wine. I love every sip of it, the dress to unimpress clothes, treat bags filled with homemade cookies, hot mulled alcohol in one version or another, meeting parents, meeting friends, remembering names, forgetting rules and yourself, coming, finding, and going… home.

animal kingdom

Tomorrow Lucas and Abigail star in their school Thanksgiving performance. They’ve been practicing hard, “standing for a really long time.” I’m arriving early to play photographer to a few classes, capturing the preK Native American love, then sitting stage center with a tissue and waterproof mascara. Because, yes, I’ve become this mom. The mom I used to dread. The mom I no longer mind. The sap.

After their performance, we’re whisking them home, then they’ll do as they do each day: they will check the mail. In our mailbox, inside a silken blue bag laced with pixie dust and a shower of glitter, they’ll discover this: The Keys to The Magic Kingdom.

I’d better make sure the cameras are rolling. More pixie surprises will arrive for them enroute. But a surprise to no one but me, apparently, will be the way I SOB at witnessing all of it. Because they’re still at the age where they can believe that Cinderella isn’t some person who went to an upscale Party City for a costume. No, they can believe that this woman before them actually lives here, in the castle… working with a therapist on curbing her incessant need to mop and scrub floors.

We’re staying at the Animal Kingdom Lodge, where I’ll be unloading our bags for a four night stay… unloading costumes and hair glitter, two tiaras, healthy snacks, and Family-Dollar Store Disney gifts that will arrive magically when they awake each morning. It just makes more monetary sense to me to do it this way, to come with our own costume instead of spending a hundred dollars on a fairy dress and hair extensions. More posts obviously to come, and I welcome any ideas on anything Disney World related. This is so so last minute, that we can use all the tips and opinions we can get.

This was totally me. This is the life I’d always imaged from my one-bedroom Upper West Side apartment. I wanted this *right here,* this kid-sopped life of learning, finger paint, and gusto. A life with a smock. And I’m in it, right now. I’m extraordinarily blessed—I really am—to be a mama, but more so, to be a mama who knows how lucky she is, and that’s she’s in it right now. “In the wish.”

Spanish River Public Library – Boca Raton, FL

Jazz on a Saturday Night. I’d picked it up from the library, but now I own one outright. I haven’t been much of a library person at any point in my life. Except in eighth grade when I’d steal away to eat lunch there, but middle school isn’t living. It’s surviving, so it doesn’t count.

I’ve always fancied myself more of a Bookstore Babe. In Austin, for example, I frequented the library precisely zero times. We actually tried to visit once, but it was closed. Or I drove past it, or I wasn’t sure if it was open, or I was sidetracked by some ice cream parlor. Point is, we’d head to an independent bookseller for story time, then I’d yank my kids through Anthropologie—the clothing store, not the section of Book People about humankind.

Only in Boca Raton is the library a waterfront property

Pictured Above: Alfred Molina As a Building

How Jazz Might Look

Because I’d heard such glowing things from a high school babysitter here in Boca Raton, I was moved to check out Spanish River Public Library. Built in the Mediterranean Revival style, if the library were a person, it would be Alfred Molina. I dare you to visit and think of anyone else. Penelope Cruz, no. She’s too short. Plus, the library features a full-on cafe, with soup and “stacks” offerings. Yes, griddlecakes. The library is my new power move.

While there—oh, shit, no. I was not there but at another library (Palm Beach County Library); I’ve become somewhat of a junkie—I was finger gliding my way through the aisles and happened upon Jazz on a Saturday Night. It’s not that I was looking for it, or anything for that matter, but it sang to me. And, like all jazz, it couldn’t stick to a single note. As soon as it was in my hands, I knew exactly what we’d do. We’d hit it on several notes.

Without apology, I’m a theme girl. And Jazz on a Saturday Night comes with a CD, where each of the instruments is introduced, one at a time, then jazz music plays. I decided that our after school project the following day would be “Jazz Hands.”

I taped fingerpaint paper to our outside patio walls, with the paints, brushes, and sponges at the ready. As we read the book, I invited Kind Sir and Little Miss to move their bodies the way they imagined a saxophone might, if you know, it was a little boy or girl and not a single-reed metal wind instrument. It sounded good in theory, but in practice, when I began to snake across the living room, I felt like Morales in the song “NOTHING” from A Chorus Line (you can learn everything about life from a show tune), and I didn’t want to know how an ice cream cone felt. Or an Adolphe Sax for that matter. But the taters enjoyed the exercise, so we grooved. I pointed to New Orleans, LA on a map, explaining that they’d get to taste jazz for dinner.

Next up, after we’d read the book and learned the sounds of each instrument, and once I explained that people who say, “My voice is my instrument” probably also order their cappuccino foam on the side in a paper cup, or refer to foie gras as the abbreviated “foie” as in, “Yes, Bitsy, she’ll start with the foie.”—moral is, just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.

We piped the jazz music outside and began to paint what we believed jazz music would look like, if it were a painting. I know they understood the concept of taking something you hear and trying to represent it in another form, but they didn’t exactly tap tap tap across the page, or make a visual representation of call and response, improvisation, or swing. They created what I’ll call “gray smear.” But, man were they proud of their paint mush (images above are NOT the mush versions but the later versions, and by later I mean what was left on the palette after they’d made their own gray matter).

After being hosed down, and as our paintings dried, I let them taste the flavors of jazz. If we’d packed the deep fryer, zeppoli would be on the menu, only I’d call them beignets. But many a thing wasn’t packed (holy hell, what was I thinking not bringing my lit makeup mirror?), so we savored a glossy gumbo and devoured étouffée, wondering what it would look like if it were a hat (a sunken chef’s hat it was decidedly so). If I had a place to teach all of this, I would. How much fun of an after school enrichment class would that be? Point to a place on a map, taste the herbs, the traditional foods, hear the music, review the work of the local artists, then create your own artistic masterpiece, introduce associated inventions, flags, languages, read associated books. I love total immersion learning. It wasn’t really until I was in college where I felt “overlap,” (the kissing cousin of The Overlapping Girl he dated) where my different courses focused on similar time periods, so I knew, in a specific time, what was going on politically (when I paid attention), in the world of psychology, in literature, in music and art. And it’s when I felt most alive. I want to give this gift to my children and to continue to give it to myself.