Plant Whisperer

I inherited a mess of plants from the former owners of our house. My family scrambled to place bets on how long they would survive.

When the P-Dawg and I did a final walk-through before receiving the keys just over one year ago, the former lady of the house lovingly introduced me to each plant by name and gave me explicit instructions for its care and nurturing. I followed her around, scribbling in a spiral notebook which I promptly lost.

A few months ago, the family had gathered for a cookout at our place, and while the rest of us were chillin' on the patio, my mom and mother-in-law stepped into the sun room to inspect my plants, as is their custom.

I could see them through the windows, making their rounds.

After visiting the Hawaiian ginger and the cymbidium orchid, they lingered in front of my Christmas cactus with bent heads a-murmuring. There was some sad nodding and hand gesticulation, and then the two of them emerged with long faces.

"I hate to tell you this, Rima," my mother said with a glint in her eye, "But your Christmas cactus is dying, if not already dead."

"Yep, it's a goner!" my MIL gleefully interjected. "There will be no reviving that one. Have you ever watered it?"

"You guys!" I rolled my eyes. "It's a cactus! It will bounce back."

The mothers exchanged knowing looks.

"It's a succulent," my MIL corrected. "It does need water from time to time."

"You said succulent!" I snickered.

"What?"

"Nothing."

I continued to water the Christmas cactus whenever it occurred to me, which is to say almost never.

And last week, this happened:



It bloomed.

The next time they came over, I flaunted my cactus and taunted the mothers with my stoopid-fresh plant cultivating skillz.

"Have you noticed how beautifully my Christmas cactus is blooming?" I asked. "And a full month ahead of schedule, no less?"

The mothers circled my plant with arched eyebrows.

"Well if you want to know the truth" my MIL said, "Even a rock could thrive in this sun room of yours."

"Dumb luck" said my mother.

Then they sauntered off arm-in-arm to identify hidden safety hazards in the basement.


Plants-a-plenty

I Love a Good Grosgrain

I went to the secret wholesale design warehouse with The Decorators yesterday to start picking out furniture and fabrics.

The Decorators are my new best friends, though they know it not. Always impeccably dressed and trailing a faint scent of Gucci in their elegant wake, their very presence compels me to flaunt every piece of design lingo I've ever gleaned from reading Flutter's Shared Items shelter magazines.

It's like I'm transported to another dimension where potty training and housework do not exist. I catch myself saying things like, "I am loving the way this grosgrain picks up the blues in the ikat! Did you know I'm a flexitarian?" when just a half an hour earlier found me yelling, "IF I CATCH YOU JUMPING ON THE COUCH OR LICKING THAT DOORKNOB AGAIN, I WILL PERSONALLY HAND OVER YOUR LEGOS TO THE GARBAGE MAN, SO HELP ME GOD" at the top of my lungs.

("Grosgrain" is a new word I learned. And did you know that "damask" is pronounced with the accent on the first syllable?)

The design center was a bit overwhelming and I felt completely out of my element (Le Target), but in the end I managed to get several photos of myself posing with various pieces of furniture, select an assortment of fabrics, a sofa, sideboard, chair AND coffee table, and to stuff my purse full of complementary chocolates.

I now wear a knotted scarf and take my breakfast in the morning room.


"Girl With Knotted Scarf, Borderline Personality Disorder"

A few of the fabrics I liked:

The Decorators Are Coming!

P-Dawg and I have really wanted to make some updates to our new digs ever since we moved in almost a year ago, but are paralyzed by laziness and indecision. So we finally enlisted two friends who run their own interior design business for some much needed help.

They came over last night for our initial consultation and ended up staying for several hours, walking around the house saying things like, "How do you feel about this banister?" and, "I'd like to see a window seat/reading nook here surrounded by floor to ceiling drapes" (I WOULD LIKE TO SEE THAT TOO!!!)

After being introduced, J-dog and V-meister, who only minutes before had been launching themselves headlong off the furniture, scattered to various corners of the abode faking shyness, leaving us to peacefully discuss our tastes and "vision" with Chris and Brett over a bottle of wine. I learned that I could talk about my pattern and color preferences for hours, and also that the P-Dawg has an enormous secret collection of Japanese prints and a bottle of Absinthe stashed away under lock and key in our wine cellar.

Eventually P-Dawg went upstairs to check on the kids and found our daughter sitting up in bed, sucking her thumb and twirling a lock of hair around her index finger with great intensity. The V-meister was clearly stressed out.

"What's up, V-Meister?" asked the P-Dawg.

"Are those decorators still here?"

"Yes."

"Are they decorating the house right now?"

"No, we're still just talking about it."

(*suck, suck, suck, twirl, twirl, twirl*)

"Daddy, I don't want those decorators decorating my room."

"Okay."

(*suck, suck, suck, twirl, twirl, twirl*)

"I will decorate my OWN ROOM."

"Okay."

"With balloons and streamers."

"Okay."

"I will decorate it with balloons and streamers, and also butterflies."

"Agreed."

"Those decorators will NOT decorate my room."

"That's fine."

With that settled, the V-meister relaxed into sleep and the P-Dawg went back downstairs to learn about the exciting differences between broadloom and berber.



And example of the V-meister's mad decorating skillz.

Foiled

We had some really strong winds come through here last night and I couldn't sleep because I had to keep a tree from falling on our house through the sheer strength of my will.

The way it works is that by staying up and fretting, I create a force field around the periphery of our dwelling with my nervous energy and thus prevent harm from coming our way. But! If I let my guard down, all bets are off.

Unable to concentrate on reading or watching TV, I got up and padded around the house in my waffle weave nightgown with the tiny rosebuds, stopping in front of each window to assess its proximity to danger. Then I woke up the P-Dawg to tell him I was pretty sure we were doomed. I had a vision of a tree crashing through our son's bedroom window and did he suppose there was anything that could be done about that?

The P-Dawg didn't think there was any danger of that happening, but he did think I should go back to sleep and allow him to do the same.

Which I did, eventually.

This morning over coffee, P-Dawg commented on the enormous tree branch that had been blown from the oak directly in front of our bedroom window. Hadn't I heard it snapping in the night?

As a matter of fact, I hadn't. Because I was fast asleep WITH MY VIGILANCE SHIELD DOWN.

Damn.

Seller's Remorse

So our little hut is officially for sale as of today, and when I first pulled up the listing, I got a little choked up.

This does not bode well, I think, for the day in the hopefully not so distant future when we will actually be moving out. I have this mental picture of being torn away from the stoop railing, kicking and screaming "My babies were born here!"

After I pulled myself together and clicked through the photos, I was stunned by the photographer's mad photoshopping skillz.

Our house looks so purdy. The rooms! So bright and cheerful! Either the photographer stood across the street to get the panoramic shot of the living room, or she has one mother of a zoom lens.

Gazing upon the blazing little log that had been photoshopped into our fireplace, I found myself thinking, "We should build a fire in there sometime." Then I saw the picture of our basement "rec room"and mused, "What an awesome rec room! You could totally hang out down there and play games or watch movies!"

In short, I momentarily forgot that, "I hate this effing house" has been my mantra all winter.

It's sad. Now that we've finally fixed the place up, we're ready to get the H-E double hockey sticks out.

Really, I'm the ultimate pessimist when it comes to our prospects of actually finding a buyer in this housing market. Yesterday's headline in the local paper was something to the effect of "Housing Prices Tanking; Some Morons Still Trying to Sell."

Some days I think that our house is a comparatively nice little starter home, well decorated, in good repair, yadda yadda yadda. Then I start looking at the hundred plus listings of houses just like it in the same neighborhood with updated kitchens, more space, and lower asking prices, and I despair. I can't even begin to tell you how many times I've said to the P-Dawg "We are never, ever going to sell this house."

"Who the hell would ever fall for this little hovel?" I say to my friend V, and she counters, "You did."

If you've bought a house or looked at real estate recently, tell me this: could you fall for a house that may not necessarily have every update or feature you are looking for, but is clean, neutrally decorated with no garish 70s wallpaper or fugly shag carpeting, and contains strategically placed smoke and mirrors?

Hut for Sale; Desperate Hutwife Not Included

Oh right, my blog!

I've been bizzy.

Last weekend was a veritable Lithuaniapalooza. What that means is cultural festivities out the wazoo in commemoration of the motherland's 90th year of independence.

How is it possible that Lithuania could be celebrating ninety years of independence, you ask, when I just told you last week she only busted out from behind the Iron Curtain in 1991?

Lithuania has two independence days - February 16th is the first one, when we told the czar to bite us back in 1918, and March 11th, 1991 is when we shed the dread communist mantle once and for all.

The upside of being relentlessly bullied by evil empires is two separate excuses to party like it's 1999. But we like to place the emphasis on our first independence day because it sends a clear message that sez, "Suck it, commies! Let's pretend the last fifty or so years never happened."

So I spent most of the weekend rehearsing for and participating in the Lithuanianpalooza, where my extreme choir sang and even the little V-meister recited a poem and sang a song along with her little pre-school friends. The rest of the time during the program, she looked like this:



Next:

With the real estate market in our area totally tanking, the P-Dawg and I decided now would be the ideal time to put our hut up for sale, and so I spent most of Monday running around like a madwoman, shoving random clutter, clothing, toys, and the odd child under beds and into closets in preparation for our listing agent's visit.

So paranoid was I about the state of our lair, that I was practically tripping over myself to offer our agent my take on things that could be improved before we put the house on the market. Because, above all, I aim to please.

As we were doing our walk-thru, I would bound in front of the pack (the pack being the agent, the P-Dawg, the V-meister, and the J-Dog) to enter the room in question before anyone else did so that I could properly lament the sorry state of affairs and make totally unbidden and impossible promises like, "I was thinking we could just knock this wall out, you know, to make the room look bigger? And a new paint job, of course, and curtains, and why don't I just box up all the kids' toys and send them back to China right now!?"

I was pathetic. But the agent made only minor suggestions for bathroom and kitchen updates and, of course, advised us to get rid of all the junk I had thrown in the basement and shoved under beds and into closets in my foolhardy attempt to foil her.

Also of note:

The V-meister has yet another ear infection. We made the much dreaded trip to the pediatrician's office this morning. The V-meister quite enjoys the Ped's office, but it frankly makes me rather sick.

I like to go in armed with anti-bacterial wipes to disinfect any and all surfaces we may potentially come into contact with and also hover around the kids like a hummingbird on crack to ensure that nobody gets any ideas about licking the wall (J-dog!) or, you know, touching anything. By the time we get home, I'm totally wiped out, twitchy, and convinced that I picked up the flesh eating bacteria.

This ear infection, however, seems a lot less dastardly than the Great Ear Infection of 2007, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it stays that way.

And now I'm off to begin polishing the floors with my toothbrush.

If I Had a Million Dollars

I take it back about the blow drier.

Bad hair day today. The ions are conspiring against me.

No, U cannot haz pikchur.

The V-meister stayed home sick from school today. We boomeranged around the confines of our little hovel all the livelong day. I'm always amazed at how a kid can have a temp nearing 104 degrees Fahrenheit one minute, then be somersaulting off her bed wearing nothing but a tutu and tiara one half hour and a dose of Motrin later. She only got ornery around sevenish and asked us to "please put the J-dog away" so she could go to bed.

Speaking of hovels, the P-Dog and I almost lost our marbles yesterday and actually considered bidding on a foreclosed house that was up for auction across the street from my parents. It seemed like a brilliant idea - the kids could skip over to bake cookies with their grandparents at a moments notice! The P-Dog and I would go out every weekend night while my parents babysat! We'd have an extra bathroom, a family room, eat-in kitchen, and attached garage in a crack-free neighborhood! All of our problems would be roundly solved for just pennies on the dollar!

But then we realized we'd be living across the street from my parents. There's a reason why a very successful situation comedy was borne of just such an arrangement, and while it might have made for excellent blog material, we just weren't up for the challenge. There were a few other obstacles - a cash deposit, our current mortgage, the fact that we'd never seen the inside of the place. You know, like that.

The V-meister overhead us talking about how much we'd like to move, though, and suggested we go to the Home Depot to get ourselves a new house if we want one so badly.

She's smart like that. Back in October, when she announced she wanted to be a butterfly for Halloween, I told her I'd have to think about where we could find a butterfly costume. She looked at me as if I had three heads and said, "Mama. You go to the butterfly. costume. center."

She thinks she's all that, but I'm the real genius. 'Cause I told her we can go to the School Bus Store and pick one out just as soon as she has one quarter of one million dollars in her piggy bank.

About Last Night

Yesterday's post did kind of make it seem as though I live in an inner city 'hood, did it not?

Nope, we live in the 'burbs.

Complete with park, tree-lined streets, and a Starbucks, no less. Ours is a working class, "inner ring" suburb (meaning it shares a border with the city), but still.

It's not like there's graffiti on the walls, gangtas on the corner, or Nikes dangling from the power lines, you know?

Which is why the whole idea that people are conducting drug transactions just a stone's throw away is that much more disconcerting.

But the neighborhood's going to hell in a hand basket didn't stop the family Rama from trick-or-treating last night.

Despite the fact that, wouldn't you know it, the J-dog's getup turned out to be more of a female zebra costume (the purse it came with did not give it away for me, folks) and, let's face it, the V-meister's butterfly outfit was more fairy duds than anything else, a good time was had by all, once we finally hit the streets.

Five Minutes Earlier

While I did stoop duty, the P-dog took the kids to a few houses of people we knew whose background checks had come back from Quantico in time for the festivities.

They stayed away from electric fence guy and can lady.

Is it just a 'hood phenomenon, or are the kids by you also no longer finding it necessary to say "Trick or Treat"? Because everyone who came by our house, save for the very smallest goblins, just stood with bags outstretched, waiting for the goods.

I demanded every one of them say it (with feeling) before giving them their penny.

But my heart sank, then curled a little around the edges when I saw the V-meister stare longingly at the glow-sticks and plastic pumpkin candy buckets it seemed the whole universe was parading around with.

She herself was toting a plastic grocery bag with the words Thank You! emblazoned across the front. (Poetic, if I do say so, myself.)

The thought that these accessories were now de rigeur for anyone who's anyone among the trick-or-treating set just never crossed my mind.

And as I thought of our only Halloween decoration, the forlorn little pumpkin with the drawn on face sitting on the stoop, I became rather disappointed with myself for my general lack of fervor when it comes to decorating and buying for the bulk of the manufactured holidays.

I just don't go all out the way most people (it seems) this side of the equator do, and the V-meister is reaching the age where she is taking notice.

Dangit.

Not sure what to do about that, exactly. I don't want to be a slave to the retail industry, but I don't want my kids to feel cheated, either.

Then again, a grocery bag full of "fun size" candy bars is nothing to sneeze at.

You can pack mo bettah treats into that sucker than a plastic bucket, yo.

Highlights From Last Night's Neighborhood Watch Group Meeting

Detective Dave answering pressing questions from members of the community:

• All's I can tell you, ma'am, is that reverse 911 only works if you answer your phone.

• Well, yes, it might show up on your caller ID. But, again, reverse 911 only works if you answer your phone.
  
  
• The purpose of a neighborhood watch group is NOT vigilante justice, sir.
  
  
• I am sorry that the sonsofbitches in city council forced you to dismantle your electric fence, sir. The likely reason was that it is a danger to the community.
  
  
• No, I don't believe that 100 volts is considered "just a tap."
  
  
• Please sit down, sir!
  

Notes to Self:

• In future, avoid sitting next to the lady who has over 100 pictures of empty cans collected from the vacant lot next door on her cell phone and wants to share them with you.
  
  
• Don't make jokes about the city ordinance that prohibits eating in your car.
  
  
• When the possibility of drug deals being witnessed is brought up, DO NOT ask what kind of drugs are being dealt. Especially do not say, "What are they dealing, if you don't mind my asking? 'Cause if it's just a little wacky tabacky, well then . . .
  
  
• PUT HOUSE ON MARKET.