Sunday Sound Out

From Chicago, where our rivers are green, people dress like leprechauns, and beer is the official sustenance, it's your host, the woman who just turned thirty-eleven, Dawn Meehan!

I don't really have any questions to answer this week. You guys have learned everything about me and no longer have anything to ask, I guess. :) So, instead, I'll tell you about my weekend.

On Friday, I realized that I'd lived in Chicagoland my entire life, but I'd never been to the St. Patrick's Day parade or the dyeing of the river, so I decided that the kids and I should take a field trip in the morning.

My alarm went off at 7:00. I looked at it, thought to myself, I don't really need to see the river dyed greened. I mean, it's pretty greenish year round, then I went back to sleep because I'm just that awesome and responsible. Half an hour later, Jackson woke me up and the lure of getting some cool pictures made me drag my butt out of bed.

We hopped on the L and began our trek downtown. I asked Clay if he thought we'd see any leprechauns. He looked at me deadpan, slowly blinked once, then responded as if explaining to a small, dim-witted child, "We might see some people dressed up like leprechauns, but we won't see any actual leprechauns because they're not real, Mom." I have got to remember to think twice before speaking to my kids. This is the reason kids think they know everything. This is the reason kids think adults are stupid. It's because we stay stupid things!

We got off the train and walked toward the river, following the sea of green shirts, green tights, green hats, green hair, green socks, green ties, green pants, and most importantly, green beer. We did meet a leprechaun (or a guy dressed up like a leprechaun). He didn't have a pot of gold, but he did have a glass of something gold, and judging by his staggering gait, it wasn't his first.

We made it to the water and fought our way through the crowd to see the boats speeding around the river, a beautiful, bright green in their wake.

Pretty cool, huh?

This is the point where the kids decided that although the green river looked awesome for the first five minutes we were there, it was too cold to hang around and admire it any longer.

We started walking back to the L when we spotted someone's toupee on the ground. Granted, it was really windy on Saturday, but how do you not notice your hair flying off?

We passed a cab with five air fresheners hanging from the rear view mirror. I was really thankful we were walking and didn't need a cab. (Don't mind me, Mr. Cab Driver. I'm just taking a picture of your collection of pine freshener freshness.)

We made our way back through the crowd of people who were well into celebration mode despite the fact it was 11:00 a.m., and we hopped on a train headed toward home. Two seconds into our return trip, the kids commented, "It smells like pee on here!" Yep, the kids not only got to see the river dyed green, but they also learned that St. Patrick's Day is a drinking holiday.

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I'll be doing most of my blogging over at Babble.com now, but don't worry, I'll post here and link to it every time I update over there. You can check out my blog on Babble here! I'm so excited to be blogging over there. If you aren't familiar with Babble, check it out; it's a great, informative, entertaining website! And Lisa Belkin who writes the Motherlode blog for the New York Times was instrumental in getting me hooked up with the folks at Babble, so my heartfelt thanks go to her! Right now, Lisa is laid up with not one, but TWO badly broken ankles. I know! Can you imagine not being able to even hobble around on crutches? I don't know what I'd do if that happened to me! So, head on over to Motherlode and offer her up some well-wishes.

Chicago Blizzard 2011

We got twenty-two inches of snow two nights ago. That was on top of the snow we already had on the ground. The wind was brutal and caused drifts over four feet high, but the coolest part about this storm was the "thundersnow". In all my thirty-ten years, I've never seen thundersnow. It was wicked strange to see lightning and hear thunder in the midst of a snowstorm. I tried to get the lightning on tape, but missed it. I did get some decent footage of the snow blowing in the high winds, however.

(Just ignore the dialogue from Groundhog Day in the background. I was going to mute it, but when I viewed the video with the sound muted, it looked like I'd just sped up the film because the wind is blowing that hard. So I left the sound in so you could see that was the actual speed of the wind.)



We couldn't open our front door yesterday morning, so I trudged through waist high drifts to get to the front porch and started shoveling. After about 20 minutes, you could barely tell I'd done anything and I felt like I was in cardiac arrest. I remembered how cool the blizzard of '79 was I wondered what had happened to me in the last 32 years to make me think that snow was pure evil. For some reason, kids view snow through totally different eyes.

Kids also view snow days through different eyes than their parents. Now, to be fair, I honestly can't even remember the last snow day we had. We're used to snow here. It snows, we plow, and we go on. They don't close businesses or school for several inches of snow. Chicagoans aren't sissies. We're impervious to bad weather. But, when twenty-four inches dump on you in less than than twenty-four hours, well, even the most organized and prepared team of snow plows can't keep up with that.

So, the kids have been home the past couple days. I've dried six loads of coats, snowpants, mittens, etc. I've washed my slushy floors twice. I painted Brooklyn's nails. Then I painted Lex's nails. Then I painted Brooklyn's again because "I want them to look just like Lexi's". Then I listened to Lexi complain because she didn't want Brooklyn's nails to look just like hers. I picked up enough food to feed a small nation off the floor. I told the kids to put their dishes in the dishwasher at least 50,000 times. I cleaned up at least a dozen sticky hot chocolate messes. I watched several hours of fashion shows. And I did a little happy dance when the school called to say it will be in session tomorrow.

Surviving a Snow Day

All the news shows are talking about the blizzard quickly making its way to Chicago. Stores are overrun with people stocking up on snow shovels, food, and rum (that last one is for the parents anticipating a snow day). But people, this is Chicago. We get snow. It happens every year. And even if the news folks give it a catchy name like “Snowpocalypse ‘11”, it’s still just snow. Relax.

The only people who should be freaking out and running around in circles, screaming hysterically, limbs flailing, are the parents facing the inevitable snow day. But never fear, here are some helpful ideas for surviving a snow day with your kids.

1. Throw them outside. Fresh air and exercise are good for kids. They can build a snow gargoyle at the end of your drive to scare away the plows that would otherwise pile the snow in your driveway. And while they’re out there, have them shovel the sidewalks. It’s not child labor if you pay them in hot chocolate.

2. Make hot chocolate so the kids can complain it’s too hot, eat the marshmallows, then leave their still-full cups in a sticky mess on the table.

3. Go to the beach. Spread some beach towels out on your floor, then arrange all your lamps around the room. Play an ocean waves soundtrack, don shorts and shades, and kick back and pretend you’re in Aruba. If you’re really brave, you can put down a sheet and let the kids build castles with Moon Sand. If you go with the Moon Sand option, you might want to hire someone to bring you drinks with little paper umbrellas.

4. Practice math flash cards with your kids to help you remember why you never want to homeschool.

5. Write a strongly worded letter to Bill Nye the Science Guy questioning his ideas about Global Warming.

6. Pitch a tent in the living room and let the kids camp out (or um, in). Make microwave s’mores and tell spooky stories around a flashlight “fire”. Or, if you don’t have a tent, set up a card table and drape blankets over it to make a cool fort.

7. Play CandyLand until you want to do bodily harm to Plumpy of the Gingerbread Plum Trees.

8. Go on Facebook and have a “poke war” with your teens. Or, better yet, write mushy, I love you notes all over your teen’s wall. Make sure you use lots of words like Sweetie Pie, Honey Bunch, and Sweetums Snuggly Bear.

9. Watch old home movies. Have fun remembering all those good times you caught on tape. If the kids complain, tell them you’ll put the videos of them toddling around in a diaper on YouTube for the world (i.e. their friends) to see.

10. Make a fancy dinner and have everyone dress up in their Sunday best. Use your good dishes and dine by candlelight. Turn off the TV and insist that no one burps showtunes at the table, just this once.

11. Turn off the lights and hang blankets over the windows to turn your family room into a movie theater. Let the kids drag out their blankets and pillows (or let them arrange the blankets and pillows that seem to permanently cover your floor). Make some popcorn, put on a movie, snuggle in, and enjoy!

12. Hide a $5 bill in your child’s room and challenge them to clean their room enough to find it. Make sure to supply your child with a garbage bag, hazmat suit and a tetanus shot.

13. Let your kids play dress up with your clothes. Have them put on a fashion show for you. According to my four-year-old, music is essential for this activity and the parent must clap uproariously after each costume change.

14. Bake some cookies. Go online to find a delicious gingerbread recipe and let the kids decorate the gingerbread men with royal icing and candy. Don’t worry about it when your kids give the gingerbread men icing tattoos, scars, or um, “body parts”. All normal kids do this (or so I’m telling myself).

15. Cancel all appointments and plans for the rest of the week because it will take you that long to clean up all the messes the kids will make while home for their snow day. Snap a ton of pictures and/or take video of the day so you can all look back and remember the fun you had.

Breaking Out of the Comfort Zone

I'm forty. I'm divorced (well, almost). And lately, I've been forced to step out of my comfort zone and try new things, like taking out the garbage, unclogging toilets, and shopping for cups (and I don't mean the kind you drink out of.)

So, I needed to go downtown the other day. When I go downtown, I usually take the train. Metra, that is. I know how it works. I know where to park, where to pay for parking, where to get my tickets, how much parking and tickets cost, where to get off once I'm downtown (there's only one stop so it's not brain surgery), and if I have to go farther than a few blocks from the station once downtown, I know I can walk out of the train station and find a line of cabs all waiting for passengers. Easy peasy.

But this time, my friend suggested I take the L because it stops exactly where I needed to go. "But I've never taken the L!" I said in a panic. Just thinking about the logistics put me in a cold sweat. Where do I catch it? Where do I park? How much is parking? How do I get a ticket for the L? Or do they use tokens? There are a million stops downtown, how do I know where I'm supposed to get off? Blue line, brown line, pink line, how do I know which line to take? What if I get mugged and someone steals my camera? Then I won't have any proof that I actually took the L and if I can't blog about it, then why bother? Thankfully, my friends are used to my insanity, so they just roll their eyes and tell me to get a grip.

So I decided to step out of the box and give it a try. I'm in a new phase of my life; it's fitting I try new things, right? I mean, you'll never get ahead, or learn anything new, or experience anything exhilarating if you do the same ole, same ole and stick to the comfortable and mundane, right? Oh, don't worry, I'm not about to do anything too crazy like going skydiving, getting a sex change, or eating Vegemite. But I've lived in Chicago my entire life, and after forty years, I think I can handle taking the L.

In case there are any readers living in the farthest edge of the city who haven't ever taken the L, I'm here to give you a tutorial.

You need to get a ticket here. Cool thing is - you put your money in a vending machine and get a ticket for that amount. Then, every time you use it, money is subtracted. You can recharge the same card. I'm like a total authority on the CTA now! Aren't you impressed? (By the way, the attendant thought I was nuts for taking a picture of this. He asked me, "Is it really that interesting?" I was afraid he'd think I was even more insane if I told him I was going to blog about it.)


You have to put your ticket in the slot and walk through the turnstile. No one minds if you put your ticket in backwards and try shoving it a few times until it's a crumpled mess. People won't laugh at you if you need help figuring out how to turn the ticket around. And no one will comment at all if you're a dork and can't walk through the turnstile without the bar hitting you in the butt. Not that I know any of these things firsthand...


This is a helpful sign. You don't want to jump from the platform and walk on the tracks. If you're not hit by a train first, you could be electrocuted. It's a good thing they have a fence to keep you from falling onto the tracks...


There's no fence? No wall? No barrier of any sort? (commence hyperventilating and backing slowly away from tracks) Thank God I don't have my kids with me! I just know one of them would end up flying off the platform!


The train is here!


I didn't pull my camera out on the train for fear of being shot. Maybe next time I'll get brave and take pictures of the other riders. I did get a picture of a pigeon, however. He wasn't on the train. I found him when I got off. That's gotta count for something though.


Daley Center


Time to go back home. Down to the L...

Next time, I'm going to get pictures and video of the performers on the platform even if I have to wait for eight hours to catch someone with a guitar.


The best part of my little adventure was that I did not, in fact, get mugged so I have photographic evidence of my trip. Join me next week when I step out of the box and sing karaoke in front of strangers while totally sober. Kidding, just kidding. Put the ear plugs down.

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Sailing, Takes me Away...

As a thank you for hosting some giveaways and blogging about Lands' End products (which I honestly love), Amanda from Lands' End invited me, Kim from Hormone Colored Days, and Lisa from My Thoughts, Ideas and Ramblings to take a little sail around Lake Michigan today. (Lands' End is a sponsor and participant in this year's Race to Mackinac.) I'd never even heard of The Race to Mackinac before this month and now I'm so excited about it, I'm thinking of heading downtown to see the boats off on Saturday! If anyone's interested, you can follow the race HERE.


(from left to right)
me, Randy, Lisa, Kim


Chicago


Chicago


Navy Pier





Anyway, we climbed aboard their boat, Guaranteed. Period. (named after Lands' End's guarantee; not some form of birth control) where Randy, one of six crew members who will be racing this weekend, taught us a little bit about sailing. Wow! How fun! I'd never been sailing before but I LOVE water and I love boats so naturally, I loved sailing! Randy even let me steer the boat for quite a while. I didn't do too badly either. Well, except for the time when he said, "You have to tell me if you're going to tack."

"Tack? Um, I'm not sure what that is, but I just had a brain malfunction and forgot for a minute that you have to move the steering thingy to the left if you want to go right. Oops." It was a beautiful, windy day so Randy just had the jib (little sail at the front) raised while we were out so thankfully I didn't knock anyone off the boat with my little, um, sudden, uh, mistake turn.

After a very enjoyable cruise out on the lake, we headed to shore where we had lunch outside at the yacht club. We just couldn't have asked for nicer weather. And after waking up to thunderstorms, it was a pleasant surprise.

From the lake, I started toward the train station, but realized there was no way I'd make the 2:30 train, so instead, I walked to Millennium Park. The new Millennium Park has been there for like 10 years and yet I still hadn't seen it. It was time.


the bean



Then I walked 5000 2 miles to the train station. The wrong train station. Yeah, because that's the kind of thing I do. Want to know why I walked? Because I was afraid to hail a cab Because I needed the exercise. And it would've been a mile and a quarter except I had to get lost take the scenic route.

I've put more than 50 other pictures up on Flickr. If you want to check them out, you can click HERE.

Have You Hugged Your Fish today?

Hallelujah the kids went back to school today! Before they had to go back to the grind, we decided to take them to the Shedd Aquarium downtown, where we met up with friends, for a last hurrah.

A Dork in Chicago

I had an interview with NPR yesterday. I had to drive downtown to the Chicago office so they could record the interview which is scheduled to air the last week of December on Morning Edition. So, in order to get there in time, I asked my husband if he could get home from work by noon or if I should get a babysitter. He told me that it was no problem and he’d be home by 12:00. 12:00 came. 12:00 left. 12:05 came and left. At 12:10 I called my husband and asked him if he was almost home. He innocently answered, “No. I figured I’d get home about 12:30.”
“What?! I need to leave NOW! You SAID you’d be home by 12:00!”

My husband thought I’d told him that I needed to leave by 1:00 (because he doesn’t LISTEN!) and he apologized repeatedly for goofing up, so I couldn't be mad. So, I ended up leaving a little after 12:00 and even though traffic was kinda stinky, I made it there with time to spare. Let me back up a minute. Yesterday morning I remembered my interview with ABC and how dry my mouth was while talking to the reporter. I concluded that I hadn’t been drinking enough water lately and should probably chug down a gallon or two or ten before my interview so my mouth didn’t totally dry up while I was talking. So, about five minutes into my trip, I realized I had to pee. As traffic inched slowly along, the need to pee got worse and worse. Let me tell you, after having six kids, this is not something you mess around with. When you have to go, you have to go!

I guess I didn’t look at my Mapquest print-out very well. I thought the building was located immediately as I turned onto Wacker. As soon as I turned, I looked for a parking garage because I'm a dork and there is no way in the world I would ever, ever try to parallel park. I was afraid if I didn't park in the first garage I found, I wouldn't be able to find another one for ten miles. I found a garage right away and parked the car and prayed there was a bathroom somewhere in the parking garage. There wasn’t. I walked (really quickly) to the first establishment I thought might have a public bathroom. It was a restaurant and as I walked in and smelled the fresh bread, I realized that I hadn’t eaten yet, so I ordered a sandwich (after peeing, of course.) I asked the guy behind the counter where 65 E. Wacker was. He said, “Oh it’s a ways over that way.” He indicated the direction.

“What do you mean ‘a ways’?” I asked, my voice laced with concern.
“Oh I don’t know. It’s about eight blocks or so thatta way.”
Eight blocks? Eight city blocks? So almost a mile? I guess I didn’t have so much extra time after all. I sat down, scarfed four or five bites and then decided I’d better get walking.

I saw several of these signs as I walked to the building. Falling ice? That doesn't sound good.

I looked up to see from where the ice would fall. Ice falling from that height could totally poke your eye out! Couldn't it? Hmmm, maybe Mythbusters would know. Get on that, will ya?

So, I played the part of the dorky tourist the entire way so that I could bring you, my awesome readers, these pictures...

The L

House of Blues

Umm, a building

A round building

The river

I arrived at the NPR building, found the office, and got settled in. (By the way, there were parking garages on pretty much every corner all the way there. In fact, there was a garage RIGHT NEXT to the building!) I got to wear these neato earphones! I pretended to be Frasier as Roz (OK, it wasn’t really Roz, but I failed to catch the gentleman’s name) gave me instructions through the earphones. Oh yeah - he also brought me more water!

Cool, huh?

The interview went pretty well. I think. I guess we'll see when it airs. It was pretty cold here yesterday, so instead of walking back to my car, I thought about maybe taking a cab. The only problem is, dork that I am, I failed to note the location of the garage in which I'd parked. I didn't think I could tell the cab driver, "Um yeah, could you go to a parking garage about a mile away from here. I think there was a fire hydrant outside. And a tree. Yes, there was definitely a tree near there. And the L. The L ran near there. Somewhere. Oh! And there were some really tall buildings too! Do you know where it is?"

So, I just enjoyed my walk in the city instead. I learned that you should really wear gloves in December when walking a mile in the city. I also learned that when walking the streets of downtown Chicago, you must look straight ahead, focusing on your destination. Do not look at other passersby. Do not make eye contact. Do not smile. If you do, people will think there's something wrong with you. I also learned, according to the man with the sandwich board, that "the end is near".

I got back to the garage and thankfully didn't have to remember what number floor I'd parked on because the floors had names in addition to numbers for those of us who are mathematically impaired. So, I got in the elevator and pressed the button for the Flugel Horn floor (also known as floor 9). The elevator stopped at the fifth floor when a guy got on, and I stepped off. I walked up and down aisles looking for my car until I saw that I was on the Guitar Floor. Oops. I'd automatically gotten off the elevator when it stopped without even looking at the number. I walked back to the elevator, feeling like a total dork for like the twelfth time that day.

All I know is that I'm definitely thankful I don't have to drive downtown for work every day!
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Then last night we got to go out to dinner with friends. And without kids. Ahhhh. We've got some of the most awesome friends ever. We always have the best time when we get together with or without the kids. We also tend to do a lot of eating whenever we get together. A lot! We went to a yummy Greek restaurant and, as usual, ate too much! I think I still have garlic oozing from my pores from the skorthalia. Yum-o!

Mmmm, Roditis!

Aren't you happy I didn't put the first two pictures on here, Jen? :)

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Oh yeah! How could I have forgotten?! I'm going to NY next week to meet with my publishers! Yay! I've never been to NY and I'm really excited to see both the city and the publishers!

Check out Mamaslike!