the grass is always greener…

saturday I had my hair cut. cheryl took a good 9 inches off the length. I was ready for a little change; been feeling a tad bit dumpy lately. cheryl fussed at me for letting my gray come in so thick. I told her I was tired of coloring it. she cocked her head, put her hand on her hip and asked me if I was tired of looking young, too. that girl knows how to cut me deep.

after my hair cut, I did some grocery shopping. when I brought the groceries in, I was only home for about 30 minutes, but still, isn’t that enough time for him to notice?

kris & I picked up mandi (who said “cute haircut” when she got in the car) and the baby, and we grabbed jessica from work and took her to lunch. as soon as we slid into the booth, jessica said “mama, you went to see cheryl! it looks so cute”.

when I got home that evening, after more shopping, rich was on the couch, sick.  I went out with my friend Cris – which turned into just a short dinner since I needed to get back home to baby my sick hubby – and she noticed right away.

granted, they’re all women, and we notice these things, but you’d think the man who lives with me would see some sort of change.

he was sick all weekend, so I cut him some slack, but today he went to work. I colored it while he was gone, just to temporarily disguise the gray.  he’s not all the way better, but better enough that I’m getting a little peeved that he hasn’t noticed yet.

on a side note, I’ve been telling him for a month (since I saw the preview on apple’s site) that he’s gonna take me to see ‘wild hogs’ this saturday, with dinner at the new pf chang’s before hand. atleast once a week I mention this upcoming date night. so, imagine my surprise when, last week I told tony that he was gonna go to nana’s because his daddy is taking me out…rich says “do I know about this?” !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have maintained for years that he doesn’t listen to me. I’m sure there’s a reason for that-maybe I talk too much, maybe I talk about things not worth listening to, maybe I speak at a pitch not audible to the human ear-but still…this comment just proves my point.

fanny flagg’s saran wrapped naked lady gave me the idea of drenching myself in his mountain dew, or smearing oreos all over my skin. but what stops me is the fear that instead of catching his interest, it will really gain his pique, as he wonders why I wasted all that dew and oreos…

last night, I was struck by just how blessed I am. madison wanted to stay and eat supper with us; I told her that we eat alot later than what she’s used to. mama has supper ready by 5:30; we eat around 7, when rich gets home. tony always eats a little mini-meal of snacks when he gets home from school at 3, because he eats lunch at school at 10:45 so he’s ready for supper when he gets home.

last night I fixed salmon patties, which everyone here loves. madison and clem were both here, so it was a big family meal. since it was so late, madison had to get home as soon as she finished eating, so she could get ready for bed.

usually when I take her home, I just wait until she gets in the door and then I turn around and go home. last night, I walked her in so I could carry the mail. when I went in, the baby was awake, so I took her from mandi and snuggled and kissed her for a little bit.

when I left, I noticed how clear the sky was, and how warm it was. that’s when I felt blessed. a beautiful night, a baby’s love, and my family at the end of my driveway.

who could ask for more?

the high today is predicted to be 73 degrees!! it’s like a heat wave!  I am so looking forward to getting back to normal temps (50′ and 60’s)  instead of the freezing 30’s and 40’s. it’s enough to tempt me to shave my winter legs and polish my toes.

a friend of mine emailed me this little funny and I thought I’d share it.

dear tech support,

last year I upgraded from boyfriend 5.0 to husband 1.0 and noticed a distinct slow down in overall system performance–particularly in the flower and jewelry applications, which previously operated flawlessly under boyfriend 5.0.

in addition, husband 1.0 uninstalled many other valuable programs, such as romance 9.5 and personal attention 6.5, and then installed undesired programs such as NFL 5.0, NBA 3.0, and golf clubs 4.1. conversation8.0 no longer runs, and housecleaning 2.6 simply crashes the system. I’ve tried running nagging 5.3 to fix these problems, to no avail. what can I do?

signed, desperate

dear desperate,

first, keep in mind that boyfriend 5.0 is and entertainment package, while husband 1.0 is an operating system. please enter the command “http: I thought you loved me.html” and try to download tears 6.2 and don’t forget to install the guilt 3.0 update. if that application works as designed, husband 1.0 should then automatically run the application jewelry 2.0 and flowers 3.5. but remember, overuse of the above application can cause husband 1.0 to default to grumpy silence 2.5, happy hour 7.0 or beer 6.1. beer 6.1 is a very bad program that will download the snoring loudly beta.

whatever you do, DO NOT install mother-in-law 1.0 (it runs a virus in the background that will eventually seize control of all your system resources). also, do not attempt to reinstall the boyfriend 5.0 program. this is an unsupported application and will crash husband1.0.

in summary, husband 1.0 is a great program but it does have limited memory and cannot learn new applications quickly. you might consider buying additional software to improve memory and performance. we recommend food 3.0 and hot lingerie 7.7.

good luck, tech support

today, mama received this email:

dear aunt nan,

hi! I’m joining in the american heart association’s jump rope for heart event at my school. I will be jumping rope to help the american heart association raise money to fight heart disease and stroke. can you help me by making a donation? thanks!

the american heart association’s online fundraising website has a minimum donation amount of $25. if you want to donate less, that’s okay. you can just send the check right to me and I’ll make sure the american heart association gets it. either way is fine with me. I will just need to have the donations in time to turn in on feb 22. thank you so much.

love, her name (….’s daughter)

now, the thing is, this kid is about 10 years old, and mama has probably only ever seen her 4 or 5 times; the last being about 7 years ago. which would explain why she had to identify herself at the end of the letter by telling mama who’s kid she is. is it just me, or is it weird to send money requests to someone you don’t know?

I HATE. HATE. HATE. fundraisers. I have never liked asking people for money, even if it is for a good cause. the boys are supposed to sell popcorn every year for scouts. a percentage of what they sell goes toward their camping fees. and of course they have lame prizes; although the kids think they’re cool.

the elementary school does a big fundraiser every year, with alot of pressure put on the kids. they have a company come in with big inflatable things in the gym, for kids who sell atleast 8 items each. this really irks me for a couple of reasons:

1. the items are not cheap, like an average of $12. so for people like us, who hate to ask others to buy things, it would cost us an arm and a leg to purchase the 8 items ourselves. in this instance, I broke down and had tony approach people at church. this was difficult for him, as well, because he’s so shy, even though he knows all of those people.
2. there are lots of people at our school who have 2 or more children. you know how difficult it is to sell for 1 kid, let alone 2 or 3?
3. they do the inflatable party during the school day, so the kids who didn’t sell enough-or any-have to watch the kids who did, leave; then they get to listen to how much fun it was when those kids come back to the classroom.

they appeal to the kids for these things, and I know it’s so the kids will appeal to the parents, but I just don’t think it’s right. the children suffer when the parents won’t or can’t sell things for them. and then how does that make them feel? I’ve already told you how I feel about kids learning early on that life isn’t fair, it really does bother me.

when the kids come home with some sort of fundraiser, I just order a couple of things and send them on their way. I used to give mama the opportunity to order, but now she’s got 3 grandkids in school, so I hate to ask her to contribute to the cause. I won’t ask the other grandparents, because they live 3 states away, and I don’t feel comfortable with that. all of the friends and neighbors have their own kids and grandkids asking them, so…if it hadn’t been for me hating for tony to be one of the left-out kids-and the fact that it would cost me a pretty penny to order enough on my own-I wouldn’t have taken the order form to church.

so, what does the ‘f’ stand for? no, not that word, I don’t say that word anymore, and I try not to even think it. but in honor of this post, I did think of some f-words that could be arranged to fit the feelings I have: frivolous…frightening…forceful…feeble…fissure…flinch…floozie…flush…folly…freak…frenzy…friction….frown…FUDGE…fussy…futile

ringo in the clothes basket, originally uploaded by hockamama.

notice the claws…he uses those on me every time I pull a piece of clothing out of the basket to fold. see how closely he’s watching me? it’s mildly unnerving, knowing that he’s just waiting for me to grab a sock. his crooked whisker is a perfect indicator of his personality

waffle and her balloon, originally uploaded by hockamama.

dixon gave jessica some roses and a couple of balloons. by bringing them into the house, she forfeited her right to keep the balloons. this one now belongs to waffle, and the other one cannot be found…

I haven’t written anything in quite a while because I’m having a motivation (or lack thereof) problem. I can’t seem to find any, no matter where I look. I’ve got stuff I can write about, I just can’t seem to bring my butt over to the computer and put fingers to the keys. oh, what the heck, as long as I’m here, I might as well go ahead and write something.

last night I – with tony’s help – staged a romantic dinner for rich. tony set the table with the red cloth (actually a Christmas tablecloth, but the tone-on-tone poinsettias aren’t too obvious) wine glasses for our soda, and lots of candles, in the hopes that the everyday blandness of the corelle dishes wouldn’t detract from the mood. I made cornish hens with crabmeat stuffing, lobster mashed potatoes, and broccoli & cauliflower.

there was a time in my life when I would never have considered having tony present for a romantic dinner. I’m not sure when that changed. he’s my ever-present companion; I can’t seem to shake him, no matter how fast I run. he’s so much fun to hang around with, and he had such a good time helping me plan this evening, that it was as much for him as for rich. he was so tickled to have a wine glass, to sit at a candle lit table, and just for him, I made chocolate fondue for dessert. that’s his favorite. so my dinner with my two valentines was a smashing success.

this morning I went to my friend penny’s house to show her how to navigate her new computer. you remember those first few days after you got online? the excitement is there, you just want to do things, but you’re not sure how…I just showed her how to set up her own email account so she won’t have to use her son’s. I showed her how to find the two most important sites, google and ebay. I’m sure the next time I talk to her, she’ll have all kinds of stories to tell me of the places she’s been.

I finally, two days ago, took down the christmas tree. I know, I’m such a slacker! since I couldn’t get rich to take the boxes out of the attic, I went to walmart and bought a couple of totes. I packed them full of the ornaments and the rest of the nativity sets from the living room. I had already packed up the ones in the foyer quite awhile ago.

I dragged teh tree out to the garage and tipped it over the side of the steps. it may be usable next year, maybe not. if we do use it, we’ll have to wrap even more lights around it, so I think it’s finished.

no matter how hard a person tries – and I have to admit that I don’t always try hard enough – someone’s feelings are going to get hurt.

it was brought to my attention that I haven’t really mentioned my brother ben and his family here in my blog. I assure y’all that this is purely unintentional, if you’ve paid attention, you’ll notice that most of my posts are about my young’uns and things going on in my house. these are the things on my mind, so they’re easier to put in blog form.

my brother ben lives in ohio with his wife anne and their twin girls kimmie and anna. they come stay with us every july. I look forward to their visit each year, mainly to see my girls, but also ben and anne.

ben and I have an odd relationship, I reckon you could say. he’s my brother, and I love him, but I don’t really know him that well. we haven’t spent much time together in years, so it’s difficult to know each other.

when I was 6, my mother was pregnant with stuart, and she and my dad divorced. my dad remarried quickly and had a son with his new wife. that marriage ended shortly thereafter, and my parents married again when I was 12.

ben’s childhood was not easy, and by age 9, he was taking care of his younger brother and sister when their mother was out for the evening. twice my parents sought legal help to gain custody of ben, both times they were told that it was pointless.

consequently, growing up in dysfunction – like alot of us – resulted in behavior issues – again, like alot of us. as we grew older, our issues grew larger, naturally. ben’s issues led him away from our family, physically and emotionally. things were said and done to cause pain and resentment on both sides. there were months that we didn’t see or hear from ben.

by the time we moved to north carolina in 1998, ben was coming around a little bit, but the relationships hadn’t been repaired yet. soon thereafter, ben met and married anne. from what I can see, she has been the best thing that ever happened to him. he has become a totally different person because of her. having a wife and then children has helped him grow into the man he was supposed to be.

we lived here for a couple of years before they started coming for visits. for the first couple of years, they stayed with mama and daddy. this was hard for mama for a couple of reasons. first, if you know her, you know that she’s not a very social person; she could live all by herself and be perfectly content. but the main reason was what ben represents. how hard it must be for mama to look at ben, and to be reminded of her husband’s infidelity. you can put heartaches and hurts behind you, but when those hurts are in front of you, face to face, it takes strength to deal with.

for the last few years, they have stayed in our house. it’s like a big slumber party, having those girls here. I can’t believe how much fun it is to be an aunt, it’s like being the mama, but still able to send them to someone else at the end of the day. I have 3 neices, soon to be 4. I keep pictures of all of them here on my desk.

I have gotten to know anne over the years, and had several conversations with ben. I think if they lived closer, we would obviously spend more time together, but as it stands, once a year is what we’ve got. anne, mandi and I hang out when they are here, which is pretty cool. I’ve always wanted a sister, now I have two sisters-in-law. I think that ben and I have a decent relationship, I don’t harbor any ill feelings, and I don’t think he does, either.

I know that we’ve got a ways to go, but I think we’ve established a good foundation. rome wasn’t built in a day, and a close bond can’t be quickly built in just a few days a year. if you had seen our family 10 years ago, you wouldn’t believe where we are today, and hopefully you won’t recognize us in another 10 years.

resting in madison’s arms, originally uploaded by hockamama.

emma jo grace davis was born to mandi and stuart at 8:30 this morning. she weighed 7lbs, 13 oz (quite a bit smaller than her older sister madison) and measured 19 1/2 inches. it was absolutely amazing, to see her come into the world. she’s gorgeous, so sweet!