Category Archives: packing

July 13, 2012 · 8:13 pm

Squinkies On A Plane!

Our trip to San Francisco is officially less than seven days away, and not surprisingly, I’ve become frantic, frazzled, restless, and obsessive.  I’ve been waiting for Crazy Packing Mama to emerge, and folks, she, along with anxiety-induced Shopaholic Mama, have arrived.

I mastered the art of car packing a long time ago, but air travel with two kids for six hours across three time zones in coach with picky eaters, no Kefir, and the inevitability of having to take both boys (together and/or separate) to the (scary, germy, yucky, smelly, small, and loud) airplane bathroom is new territory for this Mama.

Last summer, my anxiety-induced shopaholism honed in on flip flops (yellow) and sun dresses (maxi).  That was all in preparation for a beach vacation.  This summer, as we prep for our big city San Francisco adventure, it’s The Bag.  I capitalized the “T” and the “B” so you’ll have a better understanding the intensity (and idiocy) of this bout of shopaholic hysteria.

Here’s what I’ve been searching for:

An airplane-riding, city-roaming, café-dining, beach-walking, island-hiking, lap-top, wipes, and Transformer-holding, wine-tasting, kid stuff-schlepping bag with two outside pockets for water bottles/kid cups.  It cannot be leather or a technical diaper bag, it must have generous shoulder handles and a cross-body strap option, it will preferably be made by Marc Jacobs, and must be on sale for, oh, $19.99.

I haven’t found The Bag yet (surprise, surprise), but I get an “A” for effort (or an “A” for a serious nut case).   Perhaps if I just looked in my closet I’d realize I already own The Bag, but that would be no fun.   I’ve been to three malls in the last two weeks, including an outlet mall (and I don’t like outlet shopping or outlet mall parking lots), but The Bag (I’ve added italics for the sake of drama) is still out of my reach…unless I decide to buy the $198 Marc Jacobs “Pretty Nylon Medium Tate” bag at Nordstrom.  Fear not, I haven’t sunk that low…yet.  But I’ve sunk low enough to buy some other stuff essential travel accessories.

Kid headphones:

A travel DVD holder that holds up to 24 movies (Dylan is very happy about this):

A housewarming gift for my sister.  I realize I’ve ruined the surprise for her because she’ll read this, but I cannot withhold my excitement about this strange and amazing pointy plastic holder thingy from The Container Store that does its ingenious “holding miscellaneous crap” job in the kitchen, bathroom, office, or the moon.  Seriously, this is my Favorite. Find. Ever.  (More capital letters.):

An owl wallet.  $4.99 at Target…how could I resist?  Do you think it’s a mean owl?  Just wondering:

And last but not least, backpacks on wheels for the boys:

Thank you, Grandma Irene!  Since I will inevitably end up in charge of schlepping the boys’ bags through the airport when they’re “too tired” to do it on their own, I thought it would be nice to be able to roll them.  They’re so excited about the trip that they’ve already started to fill the backpacks with toys.  For some reason, they don’t hear me when I tell them we’re bringing a few toys to California.  (They don’t seem to hear me when I ask them to brush their teeth either.)   I just hope I can convince Dylan to check his massive collection of Squinkies rather than bringing them on the plane.  I can’t think of anything more terrifying than Squinkies on a plane.

p.s. At the time of publication, the Runaway Crazy Packing Shopaholic Mama shifted her focus to the sweater jacket/wrap/cardigan.  In black.  Preferably with pockets.  Perfect for cool San Francisco fog.

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Filed under Crazy Mama, packing, Shopaholic Mama, shopaholism, shopping, travel, vacation

June 17, 2012 · 7:08 pm

Cliffhanger

I need to update you on a bunch of random stuff, including the casserole, Father’s Day, my financial, um, situation, the garden, and summer goals.

As it turns out, my casserole leftovers were quite yummy.  It tasted so much better than the night I cooked it.  In other words, it got better with age…

…just like Mike.  Happy Fathers Day!  We started the day with cards and pictures:

Dylan made this picture of a spider web for Mike  – yes, a spider web – at camp:

Then omelets with hot Italian pork sausage, baby spinach and mozzarella (Mike’s request), turkey bacon, Morning Star veggie sausage patties, and croissants (Dylan’s request):

Made by Yours Truly!  I may need some casserole practice, but I’m damn good with eggs.

Then Mike went straight to his computer to do computery things.  (For comparison’s sake, on Mother’s Day, I went to the mall and bought a pair of expensive shoes.)  About Mike’s role as a dad, I can say this:  He works his butt off to provide for his family (and he’s a gifted paper airplane maker to boot), and Dylan, Riley and I couldn’t be more fortunate and proud.

Later in the afternoon, I took the boys to Target to give Mike some space and to buy a zillion and one things, including Mike’s Father’s Day presents from the boys.  Apparently, Mike requested a really awesome Beyblade with sharp edges and a Star Wars Snowspeeder.

“Daddy’s gonna love this,” said Dylan.

“I’m gonna love this,” said Riley.

(Editor’s note:  I wasn’t going to buy any toys – as if these kids need any more – but Daddy insisted.  He did.)

We ended the day at our favorite local bar & grill to celebrate with three generations of current and future dads:

Cheers to Grandpa Tom…and to Uncle Ken and Grandpa Barry who we’ll see in San Francisco in ONE MONTH!

On to less celebratory topics…

My spending:  I added up my household expenses for the week and, well, I don’t really want to talk about it.  Just know that I’ll be adding it all up on a weekly basis for a while.  Back in my Weight Watchers days, keeping the food journal was always the deciding factor in whether or not it was a successful week.  I’m hoping the same will be true here.

Now let’s talk about the garden, another slightly depressing topic.  On Saturday, we completed “Take Two” of our garden project.  Not “Phase Two” (the herb and vegetable garden); rather, “Take Two.”  Almost all of the flowers I planted a few weeks ago died.  Green Mama, I am not.  Mike planted new flowers yesterday afternoon without gloating too much (just a little bit) about how all of the flowers he originally planted survived and all of the flowers I originally planted died.  Boo.

Good luck, Take Two:

We (Mike) also planted a beautiful yellow Bromeliad plant Dylan’s teacher gave me at the end of the school year as a thank you for being the classroom’s healthy snack coordinator.

Supposedly, these plants are hard to kill.  We’ll see.  Mike planted it, so I’m hopeful.

A quick “Summer Goals” update:  I bought a “Captain Underpants” chapter book for Dylan.  After initially rejecting the book because it was “black and white on the inside” and asking me to bring it back to the store and buy a toy instead, which made me a very Angry Mama, Dylan let me read a few chapters before bed last night and He. Loved. It.  By the way, there’s a lot of poop, fart, and wedgie humor in this book, which is fun, but we made a deal to only do “poop, fart, and wedgie talk” at home when we’re reading the book (just like how we only pee on trees in our backyard).  We even did a pinky shake to ensure compliance.

Finally, here’s the “Who shot J.R.?” cliffhanger:  I have less than 72 hours to pack for a four-day family trip to Legoland.  Yikes!  Those of you who know my history of packing anxiety are well aware of what a frighteningly short period of time I’ve left myself to get my s–t together.  (New readers can catch up here:  “Everything AND The Kitchen Sink” and “Mastering the art of…”)  Will I get it done?  Without blowing my budget?  Or losing my mind?  Is this all just a dream?  Speaking of which, last night I dreamed I was pregnant again!

To be continued…

p.s. The pregnancy dream isn’t the cliffhanger.  That really was a dream.

Anyone watching the new “Dallas” on TNT? 

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