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Thank God the Kids Get Their Hair From Me

When it comes to balance in our marriage, I have to accept that Peter is smarter than me.  That’s not a derogatory statement against myself, nor is it a way to add steam to Peter’s already inflated geek savviness.

The type of brilliance that Pete possesses is technical, information smart.  He could be a brain surgeon (except that he gags a little during scenes on ER) or an engineer, he could design buildings or build space ships.  He GETS physics, he can count cards and can do math in his head that requires me to have paper, a pencil, a calculator AND a tutor. We once had a friend of his from college come for a visit and they talked about the engines on the current NASA spacecrafts and all this cool mumbo jumbo was tumbling out of his lips that reminded me JUST how FREAKING smart this man is.  I was so impressed.

I don’t say that he’s smarter than me in many of the ways that count on a day-to-day basis…for example, I have to buy him clothing in the most simple-everything-matches sort of way…if they made Garanimal clothing for adults I would so be in line to get some.  “Pete, just match a penguin to a penguin, match a chicken to a chicken and you’re good to go.”  Yet, he constantly manages to find the one or two clothing combinations that DON’T match, to my brain-thumping dismay.

However, I bow to his skill in anything computer-related.  I truly believe that there’s nothing that he can’t do, or learn to do, with ease.  He speaks coding languages that cause my eyes to cross when I happen to glance over his shoulder and catch a glimpse. His fingers fly, producing lines and lines of stuff that make computers do cool-dude-ninja magic. I don’t get it.

He are smart.

I tried to dip my foot into his pool. I worked in the 24/7 tech support at the internet company he worked at in Colorado.  I could feel my life force draining away a little more every day. He was thrilled that I was learning these things that he loved, I was looking around for loose cords that I could accidentally trip over, causing myself a head injury that would enable me to stay home collecting worker’s comp.

For a while when I dreamed myself as a web designer and graphic artist, I headed back to college to learn all the stuff that comes so naturally to Dear Hubs.  I learned some Unix, I loved the Photoshop and Flash stuff, and then I learned that the market was really over-saturated by people with these skills…at a much more proficient level than I could ever dream.

I now use my college Photoshop skills to work with my personal photos and projects and to play games with my friends where we take turns cropping each others’ heads onto bodies not belonging to us…like these.

What I did to Amy

This is what she did to me

I can haz college degree now?

Anyway.

When we decided to move the website over to a new format it went like this:

“I want it to look like this.”

“Ok, what are we using?”

“I don’t know, but I want it to look like THIS.”

“Well, we can make anything look like that, what software do you want to use?”

“Hmm.  Ok.  Yeah.  I’ll get back to you with that.”

A few weeks later we’d chosen a software, Pete set aside a few hours and he made internet magic once again.  Then I did my portion and played blog interior decorator. Voila! Website.  This is how we do it.  I make with the pretty, he makes with the functional.

But today?  I AM GENIUS!

I have been very cautiously blurring the line between his job and mine. Partially because he’s not here at my beck and call right now.  Partly because I hate having to ask him to do something that he’s inevitably going to take about 3 minutes to accomplish…after which he sighs, leans back and ask “what next?”  All Smuggy McSmuggerson. To which I answer, “Yo, Mr. Smarty-pants, here, take this egg, incubate it in your uterus and then push it out 9 pounds later! Cause, you know what?? That’s what I can do!”

Ok, see that? That conversation has never really happened because I know there will be other things I need him to do and you always treat the hired help with respect.

With him not here, I have to call and say “make this happen”…and he says “what?”…and I point at my picture again and say “this”…and he says “yo, dingbat, I can’t see that paper you’re rustling around, ya know”….and I push another pin into my Petey voodoo doll and he says “OUCH! My neck is so sore these days!”

But we’ve been getting it done. But not at the speed I prefer, which is = I decide I want something and it should be done 10 minutes later and I can’t sleep or think about anything else until it’s completed. I will take this moment to admit that this way of thinking does not generally apply to things like laundry, dishes or lawn work.

I’ve been slowly self-teaching myself to take care of these little jobs that I can do.  With each accomplishment I feel more and more in control of the website.  Which, in my mind, has been Pete’s website where I contribute graphics, content, administration and anything else not pertaining to looking at html.  Yet, today, TODAY I jumped over that hurdle!

A couple of night ago I downloaded something for the site, I made an attempt to implement it with my rudimentary Unix skills and let me just put it this way: FAIL! Things that were once perfect were all jumbled up and it was all wonderfully craptastic now.  I hurriedly went back and undid everything I had attempted to do and it all went back to normal. I sat at my desk in a sweat, hoping that I’d fixed it before Pete saw it.

My kung fu is weak.

Later that night we went around and around and tried to do what I wanted done to no success.  We both gave up and decided it was for another day.

I dreamed about it last night.  Does that tell you anything?

So, this morning I got up, I Googled and read and figured out what it was that Peter needed to do when he found the time.  Then, I got brave.  I opened up that terminal window and I started plugging away, copy and pasting the code because that way I would get it right, I worked in Vi (which is a thing I HATE!) (see how smartzy I am?? I gots the lingo!), and when I’d followed all the directions, I hit the refresh button on my browser.

What was my sweet little website going to do?

I envisioned being highlighted in the new TV special “When Stupid People Try To Make Websites”.

It worked.  Oh yes. You read that right.  It worked. ME. I. DID. SOMETHING. THAT. WORKED!

I went to text Pete about how cool I was, how much I rocked, how I would be standing outside ready to sing autographs soon….he told me how he just did something that saved his company HUGE bucks, he was a golden god of his office and if I was a rock start HE was the Beatles.

So, here I sit, acknowledging that my husband is way smarter than me.  But he’d better watch out because I’m sneaking up on him and I can match MY own clothes.

Next Stop, the Showtime Channel

A sign that Peyton is outgrowing Dora the Explorer.

“How come every time they pretend like they don’t know where to go?  They have a MAP!  They always have the MAP!  Map always tells them where to go.  Why don’t they just look at the map first? Dora needs a Tom-Tom.”

Yes, because doesn’t every preschool-age world explorer need a GPS system? Who doesn’t know that?

Frankly, she’s a little disenchanted with that felony-courting little thief of a fox too.

Sigh.

Goes by so fast doesn’t it?

Blogging for Blood Cancer, Because This Is What We Do

Any time I see a blog that mentions cancer I get excited and zoom over to read it.  I’ve found very few that ever mention pediatric cancers, so I guess our site is pretty unique in that.  However, I am excited to share some other blogs written by mom’s of cancer kids who could use some support and show them what a brave thing I believe they’re doing to share their journey with the world.

Natalie Willis write BelieveInMandy
Joanne Lee write Hope4ACure
MaryLynn Kesler writes Butterflies and Rainbows
Ami Czorapinski writes Broccoli 4 Breakfast
Heather Duckworth writes Faithful Froggers

A few weeks ago I found this awesome blogosphere-wide event going on at Goodies for Mom and Friends of Heroes promoting the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.  You should absolutely go check them out because they have some MAD prizes available for anyone who visits. If you have a blog of your own, I would urge you to take the time to be a part of this event by writing your own post or putting a button your site to promote awareness.

This worked perfectly me because I had my own Leukemia and Lymphoma Society event this week to share with all of you.  Last year, a group of the Tampa area families were invited to participate in the Pennies for Pasta program that reaches out to local schools and allows their students to be a part of a fundraising event that raised over $257,000 this year alone.  The class in each school that raises the most money is treated to a great lunch provided by Olive Garden!

At the kickoff of this past year’s event the families were treated to a photo session with Flashes of Hope that donates amazing photos to families with life-threatening illnesses.  Can I tell you how much fun we had that night?  We got our hair and makeup done by professional makeup artists, we got these phenomenal gifts of pictures with our kids and, well, frankly, any time this group gets together you can expect a rolling fun time.

We are all proud to have our children be honored as survivors.  For me, it is empowering to feel as if there’s something good that comes from having a child with cancer, we can raise awareness and hopefully make a difference in the lives of the many future children who will be diagnosed.  While the L&LS reach out to adults on a large scale as well, our lives revolve around our children and those are the ones that we focus on.

It’s an opportunity to lift our child high and say “HEY! Don’t forget that kids get cancer too!  We are fighting for their lives and we need your help!!”  It’s a desperate plea for people to understand that cancer strikes at any age.
Wednesday 6 of the families with kids who were honored survivors had a luncheon at Olive Garden with the top fundraising schools.  It was a chance to come face to face with the people who put so much work into getting out the word and teaching these school-aged kids that even pennies matter.

What was devastating was to know that of the fairly small number of families chosen in our area, I think 10-12, 3 of the honored survivors lost their battles.  Emily Lester, Mathew Gliddon and Sierra Kesler weren’t at the lunch because their treatments failed.  I cannot even explain the agony in my heart.  It hurt so much to look around the table and know they should be there, but they weren’t because of Leukemia.

Every day I blog for blood cancer.  I blog for my daughter who has battled hard and who is winning this fight.  I blog for the many children who will lose to cancer’s devastating attack.  I blog because I believe once you know, you can’t unknow.  Once you’ve been made aware, you can’t forget.

This is the reason I blog for blood cancer.

Getting My PSA’s From Animated Movies

I said Wall-E is a post for another day. This is that day.

I love me some cartoons! I adore Disney, Pixar and Dreamworks for the, mostly, wonderful animated movies they put out.  Finding Nemo, Meet the Robinsons, Toy Story, Cinderalla, King Fu Panda, The Incredibles…I love ‘em…I’ll watch them when my kids aren’t around.  I’m not ashamed of that.

I am not going to be bashing Wall-E…and I’m assuming that most everyone who’s going to see it has and I’m just the only slacker mom who waits until the weekend before it’s gone from the theatres to finally pony up the $800000 it requires to take 3 kids to the movie, get popcorn and drinks (although I did stuff my purse full of candy purchased at Walgreens prior to movie time….shhhhh, don’t tell).

We loved it. The kids loved it. I was giggling along with it. I almost shed a tear….as I did in Lion King and Bambi and that All American Girl movie…when Wall-E lost his memory and seemed to be completely rebooted.  It’s a good movie!

What I found disturbing was how the humans were portrayed.  And then I thought about it and was mentally jolted, cattle-prod style.

Brief explanation for those who don’t have kids to drag you to every G-rated movie ever. Thank you, Nathaniel, for having moved on to Iron Man and Lord of the Rings.  Anyways, the premise of the movie is that we destroy earth with the build-up of trash and pollution.  We send humanity in a space ship out somewhere to hang for five years while there is a massive cleanup on earth, making it inhabitable again.  Doesn’t so much work.  Soooo, humanity has been hanging in space for somewhere upwards of 700 years!  Wall-E is a piece of robot machinery that was left on for whatever reason and has been working away on earth, blah blah blah….not really the point of this….he’s CUTE.

What they did was show that in 700 years, all the humans were grossly obese, incapable of human contact, they only functioned through computers, were toted around in hover-chairs (which did look kind of rockin’ cool) because they were no longer able to walk and had turned into a society disconnected.

I came home to get the kids bathed, in bed, kissed and tucked good night and then sat down at my computer to think about that.

Let’s see.

700 years ago.

Would anyone have been disturbed to know that in 700 years we would be destroying the planet with our chemicals, toxins and overuse of natural resources?  Would they be surprised to know that the national obesity rate is over 33%?  What would they think to know that we have machines that facilitate the majority of our human contact.  For the love of Joe, I’m sitting in front of a computer AT.THIS.MOMENT. writing a post for a website read by people I’ll probably never meet, who are sitting in front of their computer!  Yet, many feel like close friends, we communicate more frequently than I do with members of my own family. (SHAME on me). I’ve gotten to the point that I am more likely to text you than I am to call you, I can get my point across in fairly few words and move on.  Peter and I have been known to IM or text each other while sitting in the same room…granted, usually it’s because we want to tell each other something that we don’t want the kids to hear, but STILL!

I’m a little scared to think what another 700 years could do.

Are you?

Special Exposure Wednesday

I don’t know, maybe it’s just me, but whenever I see this picture I hear Sheryl Crow.

I’m gonna soak up the sun
I’m gonna tell everyone
To lighten up (I’m gonna tell ’em that)

This is my Special Exposure Wednesday submission for 5 Minutes for Special Needs.

5 Minutes for Special Needs

Oh! And you can also find me guest-posting over at the KarenSugarPants site…she’s let me play in her sandbox. Weeee!!

Oh, again! I forgot to tell you LAST week that I would be guest-posting over at Lit and Laundry…what can I say, I IZ tired, people!