We made it!

Thanks to the superhuman efforts of R and lots of packing/sorting/last minute selling of computers and buying of mattresses ... we're here! Setup of all things electronic was flawless, now to keep small hands out of the overly accessible 'puter.

He turns 2 tomorrow! Picnic in the park is on the agenda after work, and perhaps some painting there too.

So glad to be out of the city. So glad!

ah well

they didn't take fynn's picture, printer wasn't cooperating and fading ink meant it wasn't contrasty enough. gave up until we get to MA. can't imagine the lines there will be as long as here! hot, sticky, and getting things done slowly ... got the car picked up! have more packing/putting away to do, lasagne to make and freeze (how else will i use up a huge tub of ricotta and mozarella before we go?)

off to nap, up late talking with my dear cousin R and SO glad for her help this weekend! then more packing, and more packing ... it never does seem to end. trying to look at the house from the perspective of strangers, and wonder what will interest them and what they'll never notice or comment on. got a pseudo fix in the bathroom 'rotten' corner, should hold till we get back. never thought i'd be screwing old plastic cutting board into the crumbly drywall remnants, but it 'looks' ok! recaulked the tub for the 3rd time, hoping it's the charm? scrubbed w/bleach and blew a fan on it all night, hoping it was a moisture issue. either way it's all that will be done on it before we go. down to one computer/monitor to sell, and hope to have them gone by tomorrow. need to find a mattress still, though i suppose if we don't they'll survive the ancient one that D sleeps on now. it's pretty bad though.

off to nap ...

Fynn's Passport Picture

 

thank God for Gladys, K, and S!

Gladys would be the 19-year-old Buick Regal that we're renting from a friend of a friend for the summer, yay for a car!! Affordable, just, and a bit of a gas guzzler but we won't be driving all that much.

K and S would be the subletters that have agreed to take our place for two months, at a price almost covering expenses! That means we're rent free for 2 months, and I couldn't be happier. I'm waiting a bit tho as I don't have the deposit in hand yet, and have a feeling they'll be slowish in paying the rent, but I'm not too worried about it as we should be able to keep afloat till they do.

so very very relieved :)

and you thought this was about gladys knight? sorry :)

the magic window

On the 28th floor of 1 West St, the light seem to be downright magic. Even a very very tired boy can look angelic :). The rest of the batch is over here.

cousins and 'graduation'

Douglas and Fynn are loving having their cousins here, and orange seemed to be the color of the day. We all went to his 'grad' ceremony from kindergarten, where he was also named Student of the Month for June, a nice surprise :).

His teacher ended up in tears while talking about the class, she truly loves this bunch of kids I think.

They love her too ... this was their own idea, during the pizza party in the afternoon.

The great time with the kids (and can they dance, whew!) helped mitigate the fact that I discovered my error in ordering my computer ... meaning that a ship date of 7/22 actually means July, not June. Who knew?! I've often had a mental block as to which one is the 6th or 7th month, and in my hurry to order it I didn't get it right. I'm not looking forward to hauling my current PC up to MA, but I guess it does simplify my to-do list before I leave! That's not all bad.

talking to dad ...

... and failing to confess his new tat. it's still there, as i didn't feel like scrubbing it with alcohol. sharpies go a long way :)

fynn's words

rather than update you with all the things i'm checking off my lists, and all the new things that keep getting added and remembered (can you say NYC Dept of Ed is INSANE? I KNOW you can ...) I'll try to get down what fynn's language is up to. I never remember to put such things in baby books, and michael remembers it much better than i and he's not here to hear it!

Current words of note (there are far too many to count, everything gets repeated)

• sheen! ... (machine, any thing powered that makes any noise, and can't be identified with a more specific word. always said with great emphasis.
• ackoe! ... backhoe, one of douglas' early favorites also
• VACUUM! ... still a favorite
  
• lower ... blower, for the leaf blowing maintenance guys next door
• shruln ... Shirlan, his babysitter
• ocky ... clocky, the running alarm clock, which now causes him to scream in terror every time it goes off. tonight at supper he took his sippy cup, rolled it on it's side across the table, and gleefully declared it "ocky!"
  
• douglas ... an improvement on 'uglass' which was his brother for several months.
  
• HAVE IT ... used indiscriminately and with passion
• cream ... ice cream ... you're getting the drift about now that shorter is better, and why bother with the first half of the word anyhow?
• NaNow ... candy, ie Not Now, applies to all candy and cream, and most chips
  
• ead ... dead, as in lego man lying down is dead.
• Down! ... pick me up
• peas ... please
• bonk ... pretty much any injury
  

i'll possibly add more later, off to crash.

the running story

i should know better than to promise stories, but days later here it is :). sans capitals as i'm tired of the keyboard ...

i've talked here and there about running on this blog, and keep another blog over here that somewhat chronicles my running history. i've wanted to run the NYC marathon since 2005, when i went and watched it being run just 4 blocks from my house. we live at mile 8.5 or so of the route, and i was feeling queasy that morning from my pregnancy with fynn and so stayed home from church and sat on the curb and watched. for hours. the queasiness was forgotten as i watched thousands upon thousands walk, roll, amble, shuffle, pound, trot, and wheeze by.

the runners came in every shape and size and ability, and the looks on their faces were quite the study. i saw the joy, determination, competition, steadiness, and sometimes frustration and defeat scroll across their faces. i wanted in. i felt a tremendous pull to get out there and join the ranks, pushing myself to complete something that daunting. i'd always loved running, but never had the discipline to do anything with it. (more on that here, i won't repeat myself)

fast forward to last week, after 17 months of running regularly, two marathon lottery denials, and the realization that if i don't run it this year, i probably never will (for lots of reasons that i won't go into, like moving thoughts and possibly more kids and things like that). i'd decided to run it for charity, which would get me guaranteed entry into this year's race, provided i raise (for the 'cheapest' charity) $2500. Daunting at best, rather terrifying actually, but i looked at it as the price for running on 'my schedule'.

i looked at the various charities offering entry, and thought i'd just go with the Team for Kids, which is the biggest, requires 'only' $2500, and has a great support team. They are the charity arm of the NYRR, and serve lots of nyc kids with running programs to help keep them inspired, healthy, and out of trouble. Great cause, but not something that particularly hit home to me. but i wanted in, so was prepared.

then my friend S (a big supporter of my running) started chatting w/me online, and when i mentioned the charity aspect, his response caught me off guard. "Why do you think God thinks you need to do that right now?" i answered that I thought i needed to do it, and yes God had put that hurdle in the way of my plans. and then did some thinking. and a bit more thinking.

running has been MY thing since i started it last january. my time alone, my goal, my enjoyment. i've been blessed with health and the ability to do it, and have acknowledged that to God and asked that he let it stay that way. i love getting lost in my thoughts, in the push and pull of 'how much further', and feeling the ebb of my energy be replaced with the exhilaration of finishing, furthering, and feeling the edges of my abilities. when i've felt beaten down and at the end of my rope in the last year, i've let God know that he could take it away if he wanted, but i really really hoped he wouldn't.

so after that question, i started looking at the charity partners list. i'd discounted the main 3 charities as ones i couldn't really relate to, and saw the 'hole in the wall gang' that i'd noticed before, a foundation offering free camps for sick and disabled kids, founded by paul newman. i liked the idea, and having supported Make a Wish in the past, it felt familiar. They require you to raise $3000, which was a bit more daunting but not so very different from $2500, at least in relative terms! then i looked again, and one of the most 'wimpy' looking logos, visually at least, was the World Vision one, which i missed first time through. i've been on their mailing list in the past, and found their mission to care for the basic humanitarian needs of kids worldwide to be something i connected too. food, water, shelter, the things so many millions don't have. things i take for granted. their requirements? just raise $5000 by november 1st, and pay your own late entry fee of $525.

i felt drawn to them strongly, but the $5k hurdle was just too daunting. so i applied for team 'hole in the wall gang' and was put on their waiting list, and told i'd probably be in by next week. scary, exciting, and intimidating! then i emailed another friend, telling her of the 5k vs 3k dilemma, and told her what i'd done. she replied immediately and positively telling me that despite the 'price' tag, world vision was what she thought fit the best, and that i'd be amazed by what god could do. i sat on pins and needles, and then realized something. what i think is the answer to the question about what God thinks.

the running isn't mine, it's god's. he's blessed it, enabled it, and enjoyed it along with me. but making it all mine? not cool. it's his. and raising 5k to help feed and shelter incredibly needy kids? also his. his kids, his money, his deal. and in my mind, it makes the whole running thing shift over if i do it for worldvision.

so i am. i applied, was accepted, took myself of the team hole in the wall waiting list, and started shaking. it means i'm signed up to run, a shake-worthy event after 2.5 years of hoping and 17 months of running and some inkling of what training i still have to do. it also means i have to raise $5525 dollars, or have it come out of my bank account in November, and that is equally shake-worthy. joy and terror at the same time, a feeling i'm a bit familiar with. it makes my running take on a new meaning, and adds a lot to my enjoyment. i did 12 miles this morning in the heat and sun, running from battery park up to 77th and back, while Opa watched my boys.

it felt great ... i'm on my way :). prayers certainly appreciated, and donation buttons will of course pop up once i get more info. i've got some other ideas on how to raise some of it, but will start with that for now. i'm SO looking forward to it!

Early morning, brothers

All you need is lego, lego is all you need ...

They've been getting up much earlier than normal, thanks to the intrusion of a window fan into the room, rendering my dark curtains rather ineffective. It's not all bad, we've actually been 'early', meaning on time, to school twice already this week!

I still, however, haven't learned to go to bed any earlier. Somehow I suspect I never will, but we'll see.

Tomorrow, I promise a story of why I'm applying to run the marathon for a charity that requires me to raise twice as much money as the most popular one, in order to get guaranteed entry. It makes perfect sense to me :). But first some sleep.

i'm still here ... amended

... and considerably less sticky than before. it's been so beastly hot that i haven't felt like blogging, though i HAVE been glued to my sticky computer. the consolidation binge has hit the technology level, and i've been working steadily on combining our two main computers so that we can get rid of both (and the 2 ancient ones) and get a laptop. i'm so tired of networking and maintaining and fixing and doing things that i don't really know how to do, but call friends and google like mad and all that. they're loud machines, at least in the 'come play with me!' sense and energy use and space use and all that.

(sorry i just realized this is going to be techie, so beware. i won't do it often!)

one old machine (non-working 8 yr old laptop that i think has a bad hd sector) is getting picked up by a friend this morning so she can see if her computer guy can fix it for her. one down!
m's machine, a 2-or-so-yr-old e-machine, has had all it's email (a LOT!) and contacts ported over to my HP, and put into Thunderbird, along-with-but-separate-from all my email/contacts, which have been moved into Thunderbird also. NO MORE OUTLOOK! I've been having compatibility issues with my Office 2003 and Vista, and can't afford to upgrade really, or more importantly don't want to. I'm tired of MS bloat and don't have the same compatibility needs as before. i only have one design client left, and they're pretty flexible. so I also dropped Office and moved to the free OpenOffice.org, and so far love it! I've played around in their impress, calc, and write programs, which are virtually identical to ppt, word, and excel. A few glitches, and a few this missing (like pivot tables in .xls which i used once, for our wedding list, and hated) that i don't think i'll miss. it's come a LONG way from when i first tried it a couple years ago.

the porting of m's email, from outlook express on WinXP, to Thunderbird on Vista, involved a dos-based utility that i managed to eventually figure out, run, workaround it's issues, and conquer! thankfully my brief forays into all things .dos came back to me, at least enough to navigate thru my folders and find the one i needed to work in. so relieved :)

so the upshot? with fear and trembling and a large amount of glee, i ordered a new, green, inspiron 1525 last night! dell had some deals, and i loaded it technically with ram and hd and all that, and stripped out the extras like Office and upgrades. I added a docking station so that for the most part I can use a real keyboard, monitor, mouse, and printer. But I'll finally, finally, be mobile! whee! this means a bit of financial wiggling, but it's feasable and not pushing things too much (provided we do get a subletter ... if we don't that's a whole other story, so far a couple leads ...).

the plan is to sell all 3 of our desktops, one of which is only 6 months old. i'm kicking myself mightily for not getting a laptop 6 months ago, when i was so generously offered help from 2 sources, but it felt unnecessary. with the move this summer, the unknown after that, and the number of times i've wanted to work away from the house, it seems like the best thing after all. I think realistically I can get half the cost of the laptop covered by selling them, on craigslist, before we move. the new machine has vista, as does this one (so i'm not totally microsoft free. love the idea of linux but too intimidate to make that change at this point) so the transfer of everything should be pretty easy. i still have to port michael's other files and a few programs over, and figure out his gmail, and wipe the old old desktop clean, but the harder stuff is done (i think :).

this is all thanks to m's steady job, his willingness to get rid of his computer, and i'm thanking God for both. that, and the cool night last night! the mini-storm wreaked some havoc, which i'll post a pic of later because if i do it now the boys will get no breakfast.

Amended to add ...

That umbrella used to be in the middle of the round table, and the fence is almost as high as that brick shed to the left. mary poppins indeed ...

i ran a 10k yesterday morning, as the heat-wave was hitting. did my best time ever of 57 and change, not bad for 80+ degrees and climbing! learning more and more about staying aware of my body, and regulating my pace based on my hydration and heat levels. good info to tuck away for marathon time. realized too that i need to pick a charity to run for that i actually believe in, not just the easiest one. have to do some digging there.

in the quest to simplify things digitally, i spent much of today eliminating outlook, on my way to eliminating ms office altogether with openoffice instead. I can't afford the upgraded software anyhow, and we're consolidating all the computers down to one, so it seemed easier. i've got all but one of michael's accts working, as well as all mine, so that's pretty good progress.

douglas went to the yankee's opener today with a friend whose dad had free tickets, and i was told he was so intent on the game, and the thought of catching a fly ball, that he wouldn't leave his seat! he came home with a free bat thanks to it being kids day or some such thing, and entertaining descriptions of the hitter and thrower :).

it's pretty beastly hot, though with fans in every room and the house closed up it's not too bad. i get a bit claustrophobic though. it's a cool 75 at 11pm, and I'm beat.

field day!

It was field day at PS20 today, and the kids had a ball. Egg/spoon races, sack races, tug o war, and ... of course ...


Face painting! I was roped into painting, and Fynn insisted on being first in line, and then trying to assist. I'd never even tried doing it before, but quickly discovered that cats and butterflies were easy and crowd pleasers, so I started doing them assembly-line-style and the kids loved it. The girls got into the paint later, and went to town adding to Fynn's painting, and he came home with it in his hair, clothes, etc. Douglas asked to paint me, and I obliged. It's a symmetrical butterfly :). I proudly wore it home, much to the amusement of all I passed. Fynn and I had to leave early as I had a client.



A great morning :)

i have this bad habit ...

I thrive on accomplishment. Finishing things. Been down this road before .... and I don't seem to get it. When I have things that start to go 'wrong' (ie not the way I planned or expected), instead of backing off, I not only go full steam ahead into trying to solve them, I add other things to the mix in the hopes that at least one of them will get done! Witness today, the 'red letter day' which quickly fell apart. The laptop turned out to have (i believe) a bad sector in the HD, which I managed to wipe and start a clean install of the OS, but have hit snags 3x now which I suspect is as far as I'm going to get. Why I even touched that thing today, with a web project, a paying design client issue, a playdate, mountains of laundry, and an untouched newsletter I don't know.

When it started going wrong ... I added potty training Fynn into the day, as well as answering some emails, surfing for new laptops, sending out more subletting ads, cutting up snacks and mediating disputes, speed-tidying the house to take pics to send to interested subletters, and ... you get the idea. The computer and the potty training should have been left far behind, but no.

Fynn is ready, it's true ... and did manage to pee in the pot twice before he had 3 accidents (and i'm still wondering where the poop is, though it's possible that what was smeared on his ankle and butt was truly all that there was ... here's hoping!). I'm pretty thankful for hardwood floors at this point.

The thing that capped it off was finding out that I didn't get into the marathon by the lottery system, and if I want to run this year I'll have to do it for charity, and raise $2500. I don't think I can keep up the training for another year, don't even know where we'll be living a year from now, and so will very likely be doing the dreaded 'ask for donations' thing in the very near future. I hate doing so, but if I'm to run that's the only way that I can see.

red letter day

The pics have nothing to do with the day, I just liked them. There are 4 yellow roses in our backyard, all that's blooming from the giant tangled mass of ancient rose bushes that climb along the top of the neighbor's fence. I love the look of them from below.

Red letter day because ...

I got the first bite on a subletter for this place ...
Fynn peed in the toilet twice ...
The old laptop that I thought was dead booted up ...
I found the old XP CD that I thought was lost ...
I'm in the process of reinstalling said OS on said ancient laptop ...
I found a CD of images missing for months, and belonging to a friend ...

Can you see the trend here?? :)

Now off to make phone calls while fynn is napping and douglas is play-dating down the street ... before he and his playdate come here for the remainder of the afternoon, and the house erupts again ...

I'm back!

Back from being barred from blog-land that is, thanks to an explosion in a datacenter in TX. I didn't miss the 4 days of spam, that's for sure, but I didn't like being barred from my own blog! Alas the posts I wrote in my head are still there, and fading. We'll see if I can squeeze one out tonight. Michael's gone again, he left Monday and probably won't be back until September! That leaves me with 3 weeks to finish up some small repairs here, find a subletter, farm out the cat and plants, suspend memberships and forward mail, pack away dressers and surface stuff, wrap up clients, finish 2 websites, sell 4 computers and buy a laptop, clean off/up said computers before selling, attend several field trips/grad ceremonies, etc .... you get the drift that I'm feeling rather overwhelmed and needing 8 arms.