Valentines Day 2019

Ahhh ... Valentine's Day.  A holiday meant for love and chocolate and cheesy puns that somehow relate to the holiday at hand.

Psh, like I can talk ... since that banana pun was my son's Valentine giveaway last year.  Haha!

Well, given that opening, I suppose you know what time it is!!

Let's get right into what my son brought to "school" this year as his Valentine's Day giveaway item:

Yep, another fruit pun.  I guess I can't really help it, though.

First of all, you know I hate gifting candy at holidays like this.  It's already bad enough that everyone ends up with the crappy sugary stuff like candy hearts, tiny boxes of Nerds, bad chocolate poured in the shape of hearts and lips, or those weird red suckers that try to pretend they're Jolly Ranchers when they're not.

But second of all, I hate to waste money on some plastic novelty toy that will just end up broken and in a landfill before the day is done.

So ... an apple.  Makes 100% sense at Valentine's Day, right?  Not really, I suppose.  Which means I'm sure you're asking: how did this all come to be?

Well, right around Christmas, I started working with Shelly at Shell's Creations to whip up a bushel or so of apples.  (Is 15 apples enough to make a bushel?  I don't even know!)  Being that my son so loved bananas last year, I figured the natural progression from a banana would be an apple.

And much like last year, I figured that this pretend food item would fit well into any child's existing play kitchen and actually become a usable toy worthy of escaping the landfill a day or two after Valentine's Day has passed (or if said child didn't have a play kitchen, I figured they could still have imaginative play with just a single piece of fruit.  Why not?!)

After a little back and forth with Shelly, who was ever so sweet and friendly, I had a prototype approved ... complete with a gift tag.  Then, much to my amazement ... within a matter of a few weeks later, I had these photos in my inbox:

Bing - bang - boom!  Shelly shipped, the apples are already pre-tagged ... I'm done, right?!

Well ... if you read my previous post about Lunar New Year, you'll already know that there were some communication errors between my son's daycare staff and me regarding class headcount.  On February 1st, I found out - SURPRISE - my son's age group class segment was 14 kids, but the entire preschool room comes together for parties, and that's 25 kids.

Knowing that there was no way Shelly could crochet another 10 apples and get them shipped from Illinois to me within one week's time, I called my sister's etsy shop on speed dial for some help ASAP.  (I had avoided bothering her with this project up to this point, as I knew she was busy transitioning to a new job and various family things over the holidays).

Since I had found the original apple crochet pattern for Shelly, I showed my sister that same pattern, and within 3-4 days I had the apples I was short.  Phew!  Thanks seester!!

With the apple crisis averted, it was time to refocus on organizing the last half of my son's Valentine's Day gifting - teacher presents!!  Since he enjoyed helping me wrap his teacher's gifts for Lunar New Year, I recruited his help stuffing glittery heart purses with lip balms, face masks, and fuzzy key chains (which he was quite mad about giving up, btw):

Then he helped me hold ribbons while I wrapped the bags in tissues, and it all came together to look a little something like this:

With everything packed up the night before, my son seemed excited for his upcoming party.  But I can't help to admit: for several days previous, I was feeling very guilty.

You see, my son is at a tipping point where he is transitioning from a baby (where adults made all his decisions for him) to a child (where he should have some flexibility to make some decisions for himself).  In beginning to plan his apple Valentine, it never occurred to me that I should take him shopping and let him pick his Valentine himself.

It wasn't until about a week or so ago that I was talking to a friend of mine who's son was born the week after mine.  She mentioned that he wanted to pick out a Lightening McQueen cake for his birthday ... and then I was like:

But at that point, the apples were already a done deal, and I didn't want to let all that handiwork go to waste.

Thankfully, my son still loves his play kitchen, so he was pretty excited when he saw the apples the night before.  And I knew he was very excited to give them out the next day ... as evidence to him singing "apples, apples, apples" the entire time he got dressed to go in the morning, and the ENTIRE ride in as well.

Lucky for me, my husband was on driving duty that morning.  Heh!

Hope you had a great Valentine's Day!!

The Year of the Pig - 2019

Since I'm behind on my extra mom recaps ... today you get to hear about Chinese New Year; on Valentine's Day no less.  Enjoy!!

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As I said last year ... it's no secret that I'm a Chinese New Year enthusiast.  I mean ... you don't study Chinese language from the age of 12 without getting a little joy out of celebrating what is now more commonly known as the Lunar New Year.

Me, age 17, preforming YangGui Fei Zui Jiu in TianJin, China.

Basically, I'm one of the hottest consorts of Chinese history, 

but I have recently lost favor with the Emperor, and am debating suicide.  

LOL!  So not me in real life.

So, what's an extra mom like me to do in the year of the pig?  Well ... let me tell you!

First, let's talk about recycling.  I'm eco friendly like that.  LOL!  Last year, I mentioned I had purchased these:

 

Unfortunately, I didn't get to re-use these dress up pieces this year, as I found out last second that my son's new classroom - he's moved up to the preschooler room, hooray! - is much more than 12 kids, and I only had 12 hats and a handful of small sized dresses.  Darn!  (In case you'd like to buy them yourself, here's the link for mandarin hats and dresses.) 

Had I known sooner about this head count change, I may have opted to buy a few more hats ... but a miscommunication left me thinking he had 14 kids in his group, when the actual number was 25.  If you compound a 10 hat increase with an additional need to purchase more take home treasures, etc ... well ... I wasn't really in the mood to go buy more hats.  Maybe next year, kids!

Step two in recycling from 2018 - I once again sent a kid friendly book about the New Year that my son's teachers could read in class:

Bringing in the New Year

A book about traditional celebration practices by Grace Lin

Step three in recycling from 2018 - coloring sheets!  I did, however, give this a year appropriate refresh:

Ok, recycling aside, let's talk the good stuff ... PRESENTS!  Because, what is a holiday celebration without a gift?!

Last year, you may recall, I purchased a set of 24 of these gift bags for $3.99:

Since that seller has totally sold out, and doesn't appear to be relisting on Amazon any time soon, I decided to give these bags a shot instead:

Since these gift bags were for the kids, inside went a zodiac animal appropriate finger puppet just like last year:

And for the teachers, an assortment of adult appropriate goodies - one each of a little stone pig, a scarf (design A, design B) and a chocolate zodiac gold coin from World Market:

I had originally purchased some zippered coin pouches for the teachers to put their gifts in, but when it came down to time to wrap the presents ... whoops!  The scarves were so surprisingly huge that they didn't fit.  Luckily I had some red tissue and gold foil mylar I could substitute instead.  That actually worked out well, because my son enjoyed helping me place the gifts on the tissue, and handing me ribbons to tie the parcels shut.

Oh!  One last touch.  Each of the gifts was cinched shut with a tag applied outside, just for extra "informational" measure.

The end result looked a little like this:

So there you have it.  Another year of Lunar celebrations on the books.  

And yes, I may have already started shopping for 2020 inspo ... I mean, I am extra, after all!

Moby's Top Fan

So a few days ago, maybe over the past weekend, I had an ... interesting, shall we say ... experience.

Let's dial it back for a second.  A few details to note.

(1)  If you read this blog with any regularity, or know me at all, you know I'm very open to the ideas of vegetarianism and veganism.  You then also know that I opt to practice both at various times throughout my week, on a regular basis, but am not committed to either as a full time lifestyle.

(2)  Additionally, per point 1 above, you likely know I enjoy music.  A lot.  And you know I enjoy said music at an extremely varied taste level ... we're talking Metallica to Migos to Rusted Root to Beatles to Britney Spears to Outkast and everything in between.  (Just no country, please!!!)

(3)  This fact many likely don't know: I follow various musical artists on Facebook. 

Ok, the above gets you up to speed enough that this story will now make sense.  Let's get back on track.

So whatever day it was within the last few days, Moby...  Yes, THE Moby, who at one point in time used to be a relevant musical artist ... Oh, was that mean?  Because to me it ALL seems like truth in advertising ...

Anyway, Moby published on Facebook one of his usual vegan, meant to be inflammatory, Facebook posts. 

Most days I simply ignore when he does that crap, letting it just filter through my Facebook feed, slowly allowing whatever stupidity was spewed be buried from existence by newer and newer feed posts. 

But for whatever reason, that day, I didn't want to just let it go. 

Putting aside the fact that a man made a somewhat derogatory comment about a woman's natural menstrual cycle ... which he CLEARLY doesn't even understand (because egg creation and menstruation are two entirely different processes) ... I couldn't quite stomach the fact that someone who presents themselves as such a scientifically educated individual was posting something that was so fundamentally scientifically incorrect.

For those of you who don't understand the menstrual cycle, I will just say this: creating or laying an egg is part of ovulation.  Ovulation is NOT menstruation.  That's as gross as I'll get on this public forum.  The end.

Anyway.

So I made a comment.

And like all things on the internet, we all held hands afterwards, sang koom-bye-ya, and hugged.

Hahahaha, yeah right.

Of course a vegan uprising ensued.  Not just directly at me, but throughout the entire comment thread. 

Yet - much to my surprise, some of the vegans were of a similar mind set to me.  They actually agreed that Moby's statement was in poor taste.  Though some were looking at it from more of a misogyny/shaming aspect, rather than from a scientific accuracy aspect, I still appreciated their thoughts on the matter.  Because I did agree - part of what rubbed me wrong about the post was a man calling something shameful because it's related to a woman's menstrual cycle.

Not wanting to be any further a part of the conversation, I simply unfollowed the post. 

And then, I thought ... you know, Moby hasn't ever really published any kind of usable content for me on Facebook - why exactly is it that I continue to allow his self righteousness onto my stream?  So I unfollowed him, unliked his page, and removed myself from his "follower" army.

Because, I figured ... even if I am only just one person ... why continue to let my number add to his reputation on Facebook?  Or anywhere else, for that matter.

So from my perspective, book closed.  I had pretty much forgotten about it in fact.

Until today.

Hahahaha. 

OMG.  I laughed for a good, long time about that one.

Being curious, naturally, I went back to the post to see what drove this.  I knew it was only due to that post, because I NEVER comment on Moby's stuff.

Sure enough, look at all that love.  LOL!  And not a single angry face to boot!

Sigh.  Sometimes there IS good in the world.

So I thought about it for awhile.  Even though I'm no longer a follower of Moby, I decided to gracefully accept.

Because what's even funnier than getting a badge?  Owning said badge when you're not even a Moby fan.  LOL!!!!

Let's Pretend

Let's pretend like my last post wasn't over a month and a half ago.

And while we're pretending, let's also gloss over the fact that it's a new year and I haven't done a year in review post.  Because honestly, I didn't achieve much from a fitness aspect last year, and no one cares if I recap my "extra mom" posts or not.  I mean, yeah, pirate themed gift bags are fun and all ... but there's no point in revisiting all that again.  You can search my blog if you need to see it.  Right?

Ok.

The above being said, the last post I did was in regards to my Reddit Secret Santa gift.  The good news is, my partner received his gift and liked it.  The bad news is (sad clown whistle), my gift still hasn't arrived. 

I haven't lost all hope on receiving something but ... I mean ... can international postage MOVE ANY MORE SLOWLY?

Arg.

While I impatiently await NY USPS to move that d@mn Reddit package my way, let's review a few of the positives in my life right now: 

(1) I'm working on getting back into running.  I'm doing run/walk intervals at this point, with the hope that when the snow melts enough that I can avoid ice running, I'll be able to at least pound out a mile or two on the trails by my work over lunch ... and not die while doing it.  Heh.

(1 b) Part of why I'm working on running is that I hope to do an indoor tri before April.  I'm half in half out on that one, mostly because I'm being cheap with paying registration fees, so we'll see.

(2) Chinese New Year and Valentine's Day are coming, and boy do I have some extra mom stuff ready to report on when those days near.

(3) My son will be 3 in April and he's been potty trained now for about a month. 

Yes, having a fully potty trained kid is exciting enough to warrant not one but TWO gif files.  You have no idea how nice it is to not deal with diapers, pull ups, or poopy pants in general.

So that's what's new.  What's new with you?

Reddit Secret Santa 2018 - My Giftee

Last week I posted about signing up for Reddit's Secret Santa exchange 2018.  The same day that post went up, I was assigned my match, AKA "Giftee".

Since I elected to be open for any exchange, including international, that day I was pleased to find out the receiver of my Secret Santa gift is from Sweden.  Though I was less pleased when I realized what I wanted to send was likely going to cost me $25-30 just in postage alone.  Whomp-whomp.

Don't lie.  You totally just said that in an Arnold Schwarzenegger voice.  I know it!!  Too bad he's Austrian and my giftee is Swiss - that gif was almost 100% on point.  Heh.

Anyway!  My giftee is a Swiss man in his 50s, married with three teen kids, is a web developer of some sort, and is into Marvel comic characters, Walking Dead, and musical choices such as Michael Buble and Nat King Cole.

Me:

I connect with basically none of this.  Which to be fair, I knew would be part of the challenge (and fun) of doing a Reddit swap.  I fully expected my partner to be into Sci-fi, super hero, science type stuff that I know NOTHING about.  So the challenge of this Secret Santa for me was always to find some common grounds between myself and them ... and then gift accordingly.

Oh!  Also of note, my giftee lost his eye awhile back due to health issues, and is currently dealing with a cancer diagnosis.  This will become more relevant later.

With my challenge fully in hand, my job as an internet stalker commenced.  Reddit assisted somewhat in this by allowing me access to my giftee's profile (portions which in other instances are left hidden on the site).  Reviewing this information allowed me limited access to my giftee's Facebook and Twitter pages.  Between those bits, and the general information provided via the Secret Santa survey itself, I started to formulate some ideas.  Most of which stemmed from a post in one of his profiles where Al Franken was compared to Dustin from Stranger things:

Well ... thanks for the Minnesota inspiration, giftee!  Times two, in fact!!  (I bet he didn't even realize the Minnesota connection to Dustin in that comparison, BTW).  Minnesota ... Minnesota ... how do I find this guy a fun gift that isn't just typical tourist tripe?

Well, first off, I knew one thing I wanted to do right away.  I figured, if he's even A LITTLE bit of a Stranger Things fan, at least that I can relate to.  Plus, he referenced a famous Swedish physicist in his "celebrities I like" question slot, and he noted he personally supports endowments to various charities ... so adding this all together, I decided to take a chance and purchase an authentic Science Museum of Minnesota "Thunder Lizard" t-shirt.

This was somewhat of a win/win, as it finally broke me after a year of procrastinating to buy myself a thunder lizard hoodie as well.  I figured that since proceeds in 2017 helped fund a van purchase for traveling science education, I could spare the $30 for my own hoodie and contribute to the cause.

Gift portion A - check.  Thunder Lizard T:

Knowing how extra I am, you can bet that I didn't just want to send a t-shirt and be done with this thing.  Once I knew I wanted to do the thunder lizard shirt, more brainstorming about unique Minnesota things commenced.

I think the purple in the shirt may have swayed me just at tad into this connection.

Duh - Paisley Park is practically within walking distance of my house.  Since my giftee is into jazzier singers, and most of Prince's later works were in that spectrum, why not include something Prince related?!

Gift portion B - check.  My very own hot glued combo of two Christmas ornaments from Patina:

The last thing I wanted to send ... I have to admit, I didn't want my giftee to take it the wrong way.  But knowing a sense of humor can work wonders on someone with medical setbacks, I decided to use a friend of mine as an example and followed her lead.  Since she also had severe eye issues and cancer, and I knew she had a great sense of humor about being a pirate and wearing an eye patch, I decided to select my giftee a novelty eyepatch ... you know, for the days he might be feeling a little Walking Dead-ish:

Gift portion C - check.  I think that means I'm done!

Net result - someone in Sweden is about to get a whole lotta Minnesota inspired awesomeness.  Hopefully the recipient agrees.

  

And now ... it's in the hands of international postage and customs.  Fingers crossed!!