this leash demeans us both

this is what the ads say your child will look like when you use the kid leash (let's call it the kleash for simplicity) (p.s. i love the lack of logistics in this picture. the kid's at a full, apparently productive stride but the kleash is completely taut and the mom's not even moving... plus either everyone in the background is moving so fast in the opposite direction, they're blurry, or the kid and mom are somehow really booking it. maybe the mom's on rolley shoes and the kid is pulling her):

and his thoughts will be "goly gee, mom! you got me a stuffed animal?! wait, no - a backpack?!? wait, even better a kleash that keeps me within 2 inches of you at all times!!?! aw, you're the greatest."

but this is what your kid will really be like:

and his thoughts will be "fine, you're gonna treat me like an animal, i'm gonna make like a starfish in the middle of airport security. so there"

these are the things that make the world go round

when meghan and i were talking about toys we wanted and never had as little kids, the grape escape came immediately to mind. remember that game? you create little playdoh grapes and move them through the “jam factory” where they have to avoid getting smashed or dashed or anything like that. i think it was on the market for about 2 months before someone realized that this game might encourage kids to try chopping each other in half or using oversized rolling pins (aka bulldozers) to squish their friends.

anyway, thank my lucky stars for ebay, i found it! it came all nice and ready-for-violence yesterday. it’s the best game i’ve ever owned. well maybe it’s a tossup - mall madness is a close second (technically that wasn’t my game though.) in other board game news, we decided the other day that if meghan shaved her head and grew a beard, she’d look like richard on guess who! i just now got to thinking – how fun would it be to set up a game of guess who with real people? like a family reunion or company guess who or something…

(p.s. look how sad all the emo kids look in the background of this picture)

we went to the death cab for cutie concert at red rocks where we decided that we’re getting too old for such shenanigans. next time we’re taking “butt donuts” (as meghan called them) to sit on. concert was awesome, people watching was even better. i’m not that far removed from high school, but i feel so out of it on the styles and the groups. like, for example, could somebody please explain to me the definition of emo?? and how is it different than punk or goth or indie?? all i know is i think that jojo on horton hears a who (fabulous movie) is emo. meghan just bought a sweatshirt that reminds me of jojo every time she wears it. and i tell her everytime she wears it even though she's never seen the movie. maybe i have a crush on jojo. don't judge me

the boy saw this van today. i’m so jealous i wasn’t there.

this is my new favorite picture

we had big birthday shoes to fill:

left foot

right foot

here’s how we set out to accomplish such a lofty goal:

1. rockies tickets right behind home plate thanks to bill. they had up a “no autographs” sign on the dugout, but i’m guessing after we were there, they’ll start putting up a “no screaming, ‘hey domagata, can we have a ball? it’s her birthday!’ over and over again so that other people in the crowd are even begging the ball boy to give the screamers a ball just so they’ll shut up.” they’ll also probably implement the rule “no ball boys will have their names printed on their jerseys from here on out.” the good part is, domagata gave meghan a ball. the bad part is, saxon immediately dropped it down the bleachers. the other good part is, the people in front of us gave it back because, as they were well aware, it was meghan’s birthday.

2. a birthday scavenger hunt which took meghan around the apartment complex finding lots of goodies like this charm of a t-shirt (it says - i listen to bands that don't even exist yet). it's perfect for meghan because she gets so mad when "her" bands get radio time. plus one time we were playing balderdash and her defintion of a word was "a monkey that hasn't been discovered yet" ha ha - brilliant. we had to explain to her that maybe something that wasn't discovered wouldn't have a name...but you never know with scientists these days.

and, even though they can’t be used till later, roller derby tickets for friday and death cab for cutie tickets for may (what’s a good birthday if it doesn’t extend into the next month?)

3. breakfast at sams no. 3. meghan’s addicted to green chili. and breakfast burritos. and this place boasted both. and man did it deliver.

4. birthday gift from bill and reese. reese (noun): an 8-year-old kid sitting out in a park near the boulder farmers market selling his artwork for $5… it’s always depressing when 8-year olds paint better dragons than you can. then again, i’ve never tried painting a dragon – so neener neener - you haven’t won yet, reese!

5. dinner at watercourse. shameless plug: a tasty tasty veggie restaurant. once, bill and i came here and convinced a good part of the restaurant patrons to text message meghan just for fun. and they did it – that’s what kind of people you find at watercourse. you also find a completely vegan bakery (sounds gross, but isn’t). this came in handy because meghan is allergic to dairy. so she got to choose from an entire case of desserts – with no limitations. she almost started crying. and who doesn’t want to cry such tears of joy on their birthday of all days? so it was a good thing

6. then we came home and picked up the five pounds of confetti i threw all over the house

welcome to 24, meghan

take that, bunny

after our rockin’ easter eggs last year, we were a little disappointed that the best egg kit we could find this year was star wars. luckily, we also found a build-a-bunny-house kit, so at least there would be some variety during dye time.

we prepared everything just so – perfectly filled glasses of colored water, a pile of stacked bunny-house lumber ready for construction… the one factor we forgot to consider: boys.

bill was over for the easter party and our new friend saxon came over with his art skills. saxon coincidently also came with us on friday night to a flashlight easter egg hunt. what we didn’t know was that everyone there was under the age of 7… okay fine, maybe we did know that…

meghan and i were diligently creating the cutest bunny house known to man (minus the freaky bunny with red eyes and a gun meghan pasted on the roof) while the boys were working away with the star wars stickers. then it started. c3po made his way over to the bunny house to visit. then he climbed on the roof and attacked. he was soon followed by the whole star wars cast in egg version. the horror was unbearable. meghan and i excused ourselves to make dinner (cry). we’d check in every so often to scenes like this:

hard-boiled mice climbing up the roof

c3po, r2d2 and yoda (red eyes added for effect) watching guard from the roof (notice the insane amounts of frosting used to glue things down. that would be the workings of my craftsman boyfriend. yoda’s not going anywhere)

darth vadar decapitating a bunny (it shames me to admit that this was actually my idea)

once again notice the gobs of frosting

and saxon eating a frosting filled hardboiled egg (it also shames me to admit that i dared him to eat it)

we took a break for dinner with some happy stuffed artichokes.

and what’s easter if it doesn’t end with a friendly (?) game of monopoly. it’s very worth noting that meghan kicked bill’s trash, even though monopoly is the “game that defines” him.

easter rocks

won't you be my neighbor?

mr rogers said it best when he asked us all to be his neighbor. but, how naïve of us to agree to that before really researching rogers to make sure he would have been a pleasant neighbor. in fact, the more i think about it, the more i can’t picture him delivering brownies to the houses on his street. and i bet he gets really upset when the little neighborhood posse tries to t-p his trees. and does he have plastic flamingos or one of those hedgehog shoe wipes on his front porch?

we had these neighbors growing up – the gerks. we fondly nicknamed them the jerks (and sometimes i called them the geeks, but it wasn’t until i was older and more word-savvy that i realized that nickname wasn’t really applicable. that’s why nobody laughed when i announced it way back when) they hated us. truly. we never ever saw them – i don’t think they ever left their house. until we accidently threw a ball in their yard and tried tiptoeing to get it. then ms. gerk (ps, they looked like the neighbors (the bigheads) on rockos modern life) would come out in her bathrobe and curlers and start screaming at us “what d’ya think you’re doin’? this ain’t no football field!” and we’d run off screaming, without our ball, and then tell ghost stories about it later that night. i think they took our balls to give to their dog, stinky (that maybe wasn’t his real name). stinky was a huge dalmatian chained to a kennel in the backyard. like his owners, he never left. neither did his poop. thus the name. the times when we threw balls into their backyard was the worst. we had a special spot, perfectly out of view of any of their windows, to climb over the fence. it was far enough away from stinky so he wouldn’t eat us. it was living proof of evolution. you had to be quick and sly – if you got caught, you were a goner. only the strong survived.

the point of the walk down memory lane is this – thanks to modern technology (and people with insane amounts of time on their hands), we can now be warned of neighbors like the gerks (and probably mr rogers) before even moving to an area. check this out. you can post comments like “this neighbor sucks” about people – giving as much info as you want (name, address, shoe size) to warn people who might be moving into an area. this could save children’s lives. i don’t know how many kids we lost to stinky. it might also be a funny joke to post something about your friends just to let them know you’re thinking about them.