Fabulous

Yesterday the kids and I had a fabulous meet up with Suzanne (Mimilou) and Liesl (Come, Mommy). It was everything a bloggy meetup should be. Good company, well behaved kids, and good conversation.

Liesl was as wonderful as ever, and Suzanne bears such a resemblance to Rebecca that threw me for quite a loop. So Suzanne, please forgive me if I kept staring at you, because it was a bit odd knowing that you weren't really her with shorter hair.

I have to say that I was not at my finest conversation-wise, and kept getting sidetracked by random thoughts such as "Damn, did I call the floor guy back?" and "Boxes, I need more boxes. Must get boxes." But as Rebecca consoled me this afternoon via my favorite thing ever, Skype, I can be rather flaky and do tend to ramble on incoherently, so hey, you got to see the real me. I still felt bad that I couldn't quite wake up enough from my moving induced fog to follow a conversation through to the end and to ask the pressing questions weighing on my mind such as "How DO you manage to finish a book let alone write about it" and "What did you think of Little Earthquakes because I just found it unread in my bedside table?" Or for Liesl, "How was Gran-Gran's visit" and "How are the new ferrets settling in?"

Anyway, thanks again, sorry for the flake-factor, and I hope we can do it again! Maybe y'all can shlep up to the new house, if I ever make it in there without being institutionalized someplace.

Who knew?

Yesterday we had a lovely blogger meetup with Liesl and Liam (otherwise known as Zeph). There was much excitement Chez J-E to meet a new friends, and many questions about how we knew this new friend. Which led to somewhat vague responses as we are trying to teach our very outgoing four year old about strangers...but that is another story.

This story is all Liesl, Liam and the turkeys. Liesl lives suprising close to us, who knew? We arrived almost on time despite a rocky start out of our household. Liesl and Liam were as lovely and smart as they seem in their blog (and although all blogger meet up stories seem to start that way it is really true! I swear!). C was highly impressed by Liam's train table and rocket collection, and A quickly found the doll house.

After a little negotiation, I managed to drag my kids out of the house for our planned outing, a trip to the local turkey farm where one can also pick corn and peaches and other such wondrous things not found in our congested neck of the woods. We saw the turkeys first, and I, farm girl that I am, exclaimed "THAT's what a turkey looks like?" It was skinny and white, very plucked chicken-like. Not at all like the pictures one sees around Thanksgiving. And the gobble gobble? Yeah, they actually quack. I swear. Who knew??

Because the fields were wet, we were advised against picking, which bummed me out but C and A could have cared less because there was - a playground! On the farm! With slides and swings and tricycles! My monkeys clamored all over everything while jet-lagged Liam looked like he just wanted to go home, poor thing.

Anyway, Liesl was a doll for hosting us right after getting back from Chicago, and C can't stop talking about Liam and the "sneezy dog." And while this blogger meet up went much better than our last, as I learned my lesson and stayed clear of a museum, there was still much chasing and kid reprimanding, and not much opportunity to find out all the burning questions I had about Liesl.

Thanks again Liesl, and if we ever sell our house and move, you are welcome to come up to visit us anytime! Although all we have to offer is a small patch of lawn and a 7-Eleven on the corner. No apple picking or turkeys around here. But I'll make you some bread...

Awkward

I'm so set in my current friendships that I had almost forgotten how awkward I feel when meeting someone new. Yesterday we met a "bloggy friend" at a local (to Nana's) children's museum, and while it was fabulous to meet her in person and I would do it again in a heartbeat as she was just. so. cool, I spent the afternoon unsure how to act or what to say. Plus, my kids refused to stay put in one place for more than five minutes, so I spent an awful lot of time racing off to the next room while flinging a "be right back" wave behind me. If nothing else she got a pretty good glimpse into a day in the life at Chez J-E. Me chasing two sleep-deprived kids with differing opinions around a public place while trying not to die of embarrassment. Yep, that about sums it up.

When I actually managed to contain both my children in one location long enough to attempt to talk, I kept wanting to bring up topics I had read in her blog, but then thought twice about it as, well, it seemed so PERSONAL to be bringing up such things the first time you meet someone. Even if they have been published on the web for all to read. Which is, I suppose, the irony of an internet friendship. All of you know much more about me than the majority of my "real" friends, but yet you don't actually know me.

Perhaps a more outgoing person would have overcome this obstacle, but I was too self-conscious about saying the wrong thing to move past it. I finally settled on sleep as an innocuous enough conversation topic, as, well, every mommy in the world discusses her children's sleep habits with random strangers. And as I knew we both have poor sleepers thanks to the internet, I also knew the conversation wasn't going to send me into the depths of mommy envy.

But regardless of my own insecurities, I am so happy I got to meet Phantom in person and she is as nice as she seems in her blog. As well as highly understanding about my children's antics. Hopefully she will forgive my awkwardness and believe me when I say I really did want to comment on her very cool shoes but couldn't quite get the words out without a computer to hide behind.

PS. Did I mention that we took no less than four trips to the bathroom in the space of an hour and a half? A pee trip, an aborted poop trip, a diaper change and then yet another trip to deal with the consequences of the infamous arrival of the poop in the pants. It was a grand day in the potty department.