We've Got Bugs.

Mr. Hobbitfeet and the kids kept waking up with strange and very itchy bug bites for about a week. It got to the point where I was afraid we had bedbugs or scabbies or something equally gross, even though I didn't have a single bite. I decided to get all researchy to find out what I should do just in case.
So, I ended up removing all of our bedding and washing it in super hot water and dried it on high. Then I packed all of our pillows, and the kids' stuffed animals and soft bodied toys into black garbage bags and spreading them out in the back yard to heat in the sun, while I vacuumed all of our mattresses.
It didn't help; they still got a few bites. Then one morning I woke up to find dried blood all over my shoulder. I turned to look in the mirror and found huge welt-like bites all over my left shoulder. I'd post a picture, but I don't want you to puke, and it's hard to take a picture of the shoulder on your writing arm. Apparently, I had scratched them in my sleep because they were ripped up and clearly on there way to infection.
I do feel, however, that I have figured out the cause. It's called Oak leaf gall mites. It makes a lot of sense for us because we are surrounded by oak trees and the bites have generally occurred on days when we were outside in our yard a lot. I guess we'll just have to shower after being outside for a while.
But mostly I feel like bugs are crawling all over me (I know it's just in my head). These are the kind of things that make me want to run back to Chicago as fast as I can.

What Is That?

One of the things that I really love about my home is the virtual cacophony of nature noises that surrounds it in the spring and summer. At night, it's all frogs and crickets and in the morning and throughout the day, it's non-stop birds.
My favorite is the cardinal that sounds like he's ordering Mexican food all day long. Burrrr-rito! burrito! burrito! burrito!
Recently, however, there is an unpleasant sound. It woke me up yesterday and today. It made conversation difficult yesterday afternoon. It is a loud clicking chirrup kind of noise, almost like someone keeps half-squeezing a really loud squeak-toy. No matter how hard I try, I can't put my eyes on what creature is making the noise though it is definitely coming from the trees.
I guess, though, that if you want a noisy backyard, you have to take the good birds with the bad.

Gone, Baby, Gone!

I've got to say that, although I miss my oak tree, if this is how the rest of my life's "disasters" go, I'll be one happy Woodlandmama! When I first told my sister about it she asked if I would have to pay $500 to have the tree hauled away. Quite honestly one of the first things I told Mr. Hobbitfeet was, "Crap, there goes our vacation."
Because the tree fell into the street, the city was responsible for cleanup. Everything that our neighbor didn't take (mostly the branches and leaves), the city crews came and took this morning. They even cut off the roots and left the rest of the trunk in my neighbors yard for him. There are still leaves and sticks every where and they killed my alliums and several of my lilies, but we still get to have our vacation and I even got a souvenir round from the big part of the trunk.

Mr. H. wants to know what I plan to do with it. It's too heavy for very much, but I couldn't let my neighbor burn it all up next winter. That tree has been around for at least a hundred and fifty years (there were too many rings for me to want to count), it's kind of sad to just let it completely disappear just because some ants ate it's roots and my neighbor was cold.

Happy Mother's Day To Me!

This year for Mother's day I got . . . .











That's right, the giant oak tree in my front yard fell. Luckily, it just fell across the driveway and the street. We were just rounding the corner to pull in the driveway when it fell, so Boy was freaking out. But as I said we were down the block so we're fine. And thankfully our neighbor put in a wood-burning furnace so he's helping chop the tree up so he can have the wood.

Here's our tree in happier times:

A Bit Like Chicken Little

Mr. H. and I closed on our house on September 15, 2005, and quickly learned the price of living in the midst of an oak forest. That price is bazillions of acorns falling from September through December. Luckily it's only really bad every other year. I mean we get acorns every year, but every other year you get pelted with acorns every time you go into the yard, like that part in the Wizard of Oz where Dorthy and the Scarecrow have apples thrown at them by the talking trees.
This year is a big year. Even when you're in the house you hear them every few seconds, dropping on to the roof and then rolling into the yard. It is good that the previous owners installed gutter guards or we'd have baby oak trees growing out of the gutters.
The day I picked Jenni up in St. Louis, Boy had to be at home alone for a half hour until Mr. H and Girl got home. I got a frantic call from him on my cell phone. He was terrified because he kept thinking he heard someone in the house. It was the acorns.
I've looked up various acorn recipes, but they all seem like a lot of work for not a lot of reward. you have to boil, rinse, boil, rinse, etc. until the water stays clear to get all of the tannins out because they are bitter and in large quantities, poisonous. However, if you're willing to try them out, you are more than welcome to my harvest. Otherwise we'll just sweep, or rake them up and toss them by the bucketful into the ravine for the squirrels.

Crystal Tree Persuasion

Our backyard is gorgeous right now; like a fairy came and draped pretty crystals all over our forest. The pictures do not do it justice.

Ice, Ice, Baby!

Schools are closed and the kids and I are spending the day warm and cozy inside. Why? Because Mother Nature, in her infinite wisdom felt my town needed more than an inch of ice dropped on it.

About 10 miles north of us, they're getting lots and lots of snow, but we are just getting a horrible mixture of sleet, snow, and freezing rain that lands on the ground and instantly turns everything it touches into a potential ice skating rink.

In addition to all this fun, we have high winds. Perhaps if I had a boat made for ice sailing I would have been able to get to work. I decided to just stay home rather than brave the 30 miles only to be told, as the storm picked up, to go home before it gets too bad. At least this way I'll get my Friday housework done today so that we can still make it to Chicago for the weekend.

Here is a view of our ice forest:

Living in a mess.

Spending every Christmas away from home is a challenge. Coming back home with a sick kid, being thoroughly wiped out, AND coming back to the huge mess you left in the rush to get gone is down right frustrating.

I remember the mindset that I left with. I spend my Friday, December 22 doing every speck of laundry that I had skipped for so many days when I had been trying like mad to finish my shopping. I also had to buy ingredients for party noshes and then prepare said noshes (which took some doing as my grinder broke). So I said, what's the big deal. We'll do the dishes and we'll get busy cleaning when we get home. It'll be easy, we'll have one less kid, maybe we'll even get rid of some old toys to make room for the new ones.

What we didn't count on was Girl being SO sick, neither Mr. Hobbitfeet nor myself getting more than 4 hours a sleep for almost a week, and just how overwhelming the mess would be once we added all the Christmas stuff to it.

And it's not like there is a lot of stuff. The gods blessed us this year and everything we got was smallish. Small enough that we were able to fit everything into our car, even with a bike (though truth be told, had Boy come home with us that wouldn't have happened).

But the house is trashed, which makes it difficult to function. Does anyone else have this problem? When the house is a little messy, I can rush around and clean it. When it is a big mess, just the thought of how long it will take, makes it nearly impossible to move on it. I guess it's just the lazy-ass-bitch in me coming out.

Where's Mary Poppins when you need her?

Roadside Recognition

In a moment of boredom I googled my name and was pleased to see that Roadside America had published my update! Thanks Abe!

Also here's a link to the resort I was talking about in the update.

Facts About Me!

1. As the mother of a 22-days-away-from-three-year-old, quite-recently-potty-trained little girl, I feel that I incessantly talk about poop. I don't think a day goes by that the word poop doesn't come out of my mouth at least three or four times a day.


2. I am a snob. An imagination snob. Boy lives and breathes Bionicals and wants to give us whole histories of them. Histories he read in Bionical books and on their website, and I have no tolerance for it. When he tells me stories that he made up or that he dreamed, I will listen intently for hours, but the minute he carries one of those damn things out of his room talking about the histories of the moo-laka-moo* mask my eyes cloud over and I don't hear a word he says. Also when he shows me Bionicles that he made based on instructions in a book, I say things like "neat" or "great job," but when he shows me Bionicles that he made on his own, I say things like "that's awesome" or "that's really cool!"

*I made that name up, as I said, I don't listen to bionical talk.


3. No matter how much fun Boy has with him, and no matter that he is Boy's "Best Friend", I will always hate Captain Obnoxious! He came over for a few hours today, and ever time Mr. Hobbitfeet came near me I was rolling my eyes and shaking my head. C.O. was terrified of our mini-dog so we put up the baby gate to keep Giles out of Boy's room while still having the door open to monitor play and C.O. kept taunting him from behind the gate. Then when Giles gave up and came to the family room to lay down, C.O. called him and freaked out when he ran to the gate. I finally had to say, "if you don't plan on playing with the dog, leave him alone." It took all the power on earth to not call him a little jerk as he shrieked and bossed his way around my house. I hate him, and hate the fact that I hate him., especially since Boy loved having him over.


4. I am stupid enough to accidentally spray cold Windex onto a hot lightbulb, causing that lightbulb to explode and also causing one of the red hot glass shards to land on my chest and burn me enough to give a blister. I am also stupid enough to pop that blister.



5. I have given my TBMITW crown to my mom. Because even though financial setbacks have made us rely too much on her, she doesn't hold it against us and still knows that with me nothing can trump PURPLE RUSSIAN NESTING DOLLS!


Check them out, keeping the ones from Lithuania company (also that's Mr. H.'s Pensive Jesus from Lithuania)

Return to My Hermatige...

After spending a great deal of time in Chicago recently, I was very happy to return to my sanctuary in the woods. There is nothing like spending several days in a Loop hotel room during the course of two weeks to make one (at least this one) appreciate the wonder and beauty of nature, especially the frog/cicada symphony that soothes me to sleep each night. Also, I forgot how damn bright Chicago is at night. It's like sleeping with your lights on. I couldn't sleep unless I had those really thick hotel curtains closed. People, it's called night because it is supposed to be dark. In my woodland home you’re lucky to see three feet in front of you at night. A fact which caused one of our city friends to declare our street "really freaky." Don't get me wrong, I love Chicago. It was fun taking Girl to the Zoo. It was even more fun the next week to be there by myself, even if I missed my kids when I was at the Crown Fountain in Millennium Park. And a big sorry to my friends that I was supposed to see and didn't, I really wanted to, the seminar crap took longer than expected. And a big thanks to my mom for taking me to Greek Town. The food was yummy; you just can't get stuff like that here. In fact, I think I ate too much Saganaki.

My Super Sweet Vacation Day!

I am taking a vacation day tomorrow. Guess why? Well to clean of course. Just me and my giant economy size soap!!! You see, two weeks ago my house was immaculate. You could perform surgery in my bathroom. But two weeks build-up and Mr. Hobbitfeet worked on Saturday so I entertained children and did everything but clean. The problem is we're having company this weekend. And Mr. H. has to work five hours of overtime. It seems to me that his work only ever makes him work overtime when we have stuff to do.

Anyhow the crap keeps piling up, so I am using my precious vacation hours to get it done.

" Goin' Where the Water Tastes Like Wine..."

One of the few people I talk to at work up and quit on me. Today was my first day at work without her and so I sat with some random people at lunch and of course got the question that I always get: "Why'd you move here?" (Now "here" must be said with disdain, like why would I leave the wonders of the big city to come live in "Green Acres." And I always defend it because as everyone knows, It's "the place for me." But I will not lie, there are pros and cons to the choice.

Things I love about small town life:
1. "Those trees, those trees, those.....trees, mile after mile in the fresh morning breeze" * I can't get enough of the trees. There are so many different kinds, ginko, cherry, tulip, oak, maple, flowering dogwood, basswood etc. I can chill in my backyard and pretend I'm little Laura Ingalls before they left the big woods * (All I need is an inflated pig bladder).

2. "Land, lots of land and the starry skies above" Sometimes when I am driving home from work, I just look around and marval and how damn big the world looks, in the city it doesn't look so horizontal, it's more vertical, and I hate heights.

3. My house. There is no way in hell I would have gotten a house (and property) like this in Chicago ( or the suburbs) for what we paid for our house. There is no way we would have been able to afford a house in Chicago.

4. Good public schools.

5. Being able to let my son go outside by himself. When we were in Chicago (Bridgeport) Boy couldn't even go in our backyard because there wasn't a fence and the kids on the block were hoods.

6. Everybody is nice. Real nice people say high and hold open doors. They help you fix things and sometimes the neighbors make you brownies. Employers give you benefits so you'll want to stay instead of taking everything away from you and keeping your self-esteem so low you feel like you couldn't leave if you wanted to.

7. The worst the traffic ever gets is when you come up on some farm equipment just when a no passing zone starts.

There's more I am just blanking

Here is what I miss about Chicago:

1. Museums, theater, culture.

2. Food. Foreign foods like Thai, Greek, and actual pizza. Bobaks Gobloki and potato pancakes. "Healthy Foods," "Pancho Pistoles,"and "Franco's" in Bridgeport, Strawberry Chicken Salad from the Walnut Room and Chicken Curry from 7 on State. Spring Rolls, Italian sausage with marinara, Italian beef with Au Ju. Uncommon fruit like kiwi, kumquats, star fruit. I want sandwiches called "Sloppy Joes" instead of "Indy Sandwiches" (They're the same thing but damn it call it a "Sloppy Joe" and actually I don't miss them, I just miss the right name, they have them all the time at my work.) I'll stop you get it.

3. My friends and family

4. People who are: African-American, Jewish, Hispanic, Asian, gay, brilliantly cynical, homeless and crazy, etc. In other words, I miss differences. There isn't too much difference here. You'll never be able to hear six different languages spoken on the same bus (especially because there are no buses) and that sucks.

Thanks for getting this far in my rant, I'll stop now.

Haunted?

I have been taking pictures of dilapidated buildings in the area lately. On Thursday I made a stop at Ashmore Estates, a must for those snapping pics of abandoned buildings in the area. There is a hot debate around here is it haunted or not. I won't try to influence anyone on the subject but here is a picture I cropped from one that I took. Mr. Hobbitfeet says I'm silly, that it's just a reflection of the leaves; however, I am not sure really which leaves would make a reflection like that. That's all I'm saying. Original Picture.

Autophobic with a side of Achluophobia

Mr. Hobbitfeet is going to Chicago overnight for work next week and I am terrified. I hate, hate, HATE being alone at night. I freak out. I always have and I don't see me suddenly getting brave enough to face the music next week. I have already switched my work days next week so that I won't have to work the day after my night alone, because I know that I won't sleep.
But the prospect of being the only adult in this house for a whole night is making my stomache hurt. I'll keep you posted.

A Love Poem

Roses are red.

Rocks are hard.

I can't say it enough,

I LOVE my backyard!

Sometimes I bitch.

I have had a terrible week and every moment it gets worse.
I think that mother nature hates me. Everyday that I have to work, it is GORGEOUS outside. The minute I have sometime off, it gets cold or rainy. I want a nice day at home, where I can enjoy it.
Work is less pleasant then usual, and I know, I know, it's work being unpleasant is its job; but I am very tired of the reward for a job well done is twice as much crap to do. We revamped our website, switched servers and the software we use to maintain it, but our previous website is incompatible and I am forced to spend hours on end inputting countless page after page just to make it look like it used to look. Then everyone is like, "What have you been doing?"
Also, I am fed up with bad drivers. My thirty mile commute (one way) is set up so that it is next to impossible to pass people 75% of the time, especially between the town in which I live and the one directly east of it. However there is a special truck/slow car lane at one spot that is specially designed to let the fast people get past the slow people. I feel that people traveling 2 miles above speed limit do not qualify for this lane. People, if I am riding up your butt when it is time for this pass, GET OUT OF MY WAY! If you are not going to pass the person in front of you who has moved into the right lane, GET OUT OF MY WAY! Also, and most importantly if you are a truck, you must move over and get into the truck lane, that is why it says TRUCK LANE!!! I am trying to get somewhere and I am tired of being stuck behind your stupid 57 mph butt when I want to go 70! Maybe I'll get a ticket, but I don't care; I just want to get to work/home.

Bragging

It was nearly 80 degrees today. Here are the kids playing outside in their shorts!

Ahhhh!!

This is my favorite time of year. The word they use in Bambi is "twitterpatted". Only for me it doesn't mean falling for the opposite sex (though I do love you Mr. Hobbitfeet). It means the excitement that I have because there are leaves, birds and everything again. THIS is why I left Chicago. Nature!

All these pictures were taken in my backyard, are you jealous?

First Full Day of Spring......

Yeah Right!