November 2007
I believe my father is the consummate list maker. He used to keep his list on several pages of a legal pad, and we would take it to town once a week, a big deal for us, since we lived 30 miles away. He had a system that involved an asterisk when he needed to have something along to accomplish a particular item, for example depositing a check. Since the advent of the computer age, I am sure his list is on his laptop. I completed my apprenticeship to him, and now have struck out on my own as far as list making goes.
Since I started staying at home, I bought a white board for the fridge and I use it for all my jottings, it is very handy for when you need to add to the grocery list, or remember a hair appointment. I need to make a list of chores for the kids to complete each day.
My friend Old Hat invited us to make a list of our proudest moments, and since then I have been thinking of the lists I have all over the place. Scatterbrained before having four children, I am now a sieve when it comes to remembering things. Following are lists I actually have around the house and refer to
TV shows I like to watch and what time and day they are on (7 a week all on ABC)
The time pre-school starts and ends, as well as dance classes
Books I have read since November 1 last year (118)
Books I want to read (no number that big yet)
Movies I want to add to my Netflix queue (about 50)
When they have baby story times at the library
Being a visual person, I can make a list and lose it, but remember most of what was on it, for example tonight I got into the grocery store (by myself!) to find that my list was waiting for me in the pickup with four kids, an Australian Shepard dog and a husband who had slipped off to fuel up the pickup. Hmm, well I just now slipped out to retrieve my list from the pickup and laughed thinking of myself riding home with my feet on the cat food, so Jake didn’t have a snack on the way home. I forgot Parmesan cheese and Saran Wrap from a nine item list, and the only thing I bought that wasn’t on the list was…Oreos. I use Saran Wrap maybe once a month or less, and I am sure the cheese can wait too.
Some of my recent thoughts have presented themselves in lists, so here they are.
Things my husband has brought home from work, free
3 huge boxes of lettuce
1 big box of crab legs, enough for several meals
Cauliflower
Jelly Bellies
Raw popcorn, I haven’t purchased popcorn since 1997, and my kids have never seen microwave popcorn
2 cases of canned cat food
Broccoli
1000 pounds of potatoes (not a typo)
Raspberries and Strawberries (nearly free)
Ground corn suitable for livestock feed
Enough coats and hats and shirts to clothe a platoon
Wodka (Russian vodka)
Things I, as a mother of three other children, should have remembered when the fourth one came along…
Don’t buy an outfit that buttons down the back, they are a pain for everyone involved. (In my defense, it is really cute, and has one of those front pockets where you can put both hands in the same pocket, never mind that my one-week-old has yet to find his hands much less his pockets.)
Put nursing pads in the diaper bag.
Make sure to look at the back of your shirt before leaving the house.
Things about my babies that I probably shouldn’t share.
As infants their profiles have all looked like Alfred Hitchcock
I read a book by Jennifer Weiner where she described a newborn baby as looking like a very angry old man. It took my breath away, as I have had the same exact thought
When we get two kid legs in one pants leg while dressing, I tell my kids they are mermaids
I told them our kitty Pumpkin didn’t look both ways before crossing the road and that is why she died.
Mae slept in a dresser drawer at my mother’s house
I call breast milk nummies, for example, “Baby is eating his nummies”
My kids like Mary Poppins a lot better than Sponge Bob
Babies don’t have morning breath
I sung a Kenny Rogers song when they were cranky in the middle of the night, “I know it’s late, I know you’re weary, I know your plans don’t include me, still here we are, both of us lonely, both of us searching for something …..”
The ladies can quote large parts of Old Possum’s Guide to Practical Cats
I made up a parody to the Goldfish jingle about breast milk, don’t remember it now, something about “the food that fights back, breast milk”
Tommy has pink and purple jammies
Tommy’s jowls jiggle when he runs, and he runs like Frankenstein – arms outstretched
When the ladies play dress-up I put Tommy in Lydia’s old Pebbles Halloween costume, and he looks a little like Fred Flintstone
Last year for Christmas, Lydia told Santa she wanted a baby doll. This was because we don’t watch broadcast cartoons, so she had no idea what she “should” be asking for. Thank God for PBS Kids, and the networks’ apparent unwillingness to broadcast decent cartoons on Saturday morn (and Barney tapes)
SUBLIST of TV stations we get with the Prairie Package Plus
ABC
NBC
CBS
PBS
FOX (the plus part)
I also have a list of things I want to blog about.