We got the postcard!

We've made it onto Family Feud. :)

Family Time

"Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family:
Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one."
~Jane Howard

With my hubby out of town, I've been spending lots of quality time with my siblings. On Saturday morning I went hiking with Chris and our dogs in Temescal Canyon. Afterwards we had a nice leisurely breakfast in the Palisades. Later that afternoon, I went and hung out with Cookie. She helped me with my hair and in exchange forced me to watch the new tv show Cane. I have to admit it was a pretty good show. I'm not going to start watching tv because of it though.

On Sunday I went over to Marfua's for a barbecue. The Soulja Boy song came up again and we spent quite a bit of time learning the dance ourselves. Now I can't wait to start dancing with the kids. :)

Tonight I had some more quality time with my family. We were Fueding. Cookie got us an audition for the Family Feud and we all braved the traffic to get there in time (Marfua and I were quite tardy, but we were not too late to audition). When I was imagining the audition I thought we would be the only family, and it would be a sort of screen test to test out our personality and our gaming skills. It turns out that we were one of 16 or so families. First they started off with a primer about how to be VERY ENTHUSIASTIC. Always make a guess and be VERY ENTHUSIASTIC. Huddle at the appropriate time and be VERY ENTHUSIASTIC. Support your family, always say "Good Answer!!" even if it's the worst answer in the entire world, oh and be VERY ENTHUSIASTIC. If anyone knows our family, enthusiasm is not a problem for us. We were feeling very ok.
After they went though the general "BE VERY ENTHUSIASTIC" primer and the rules of the game, they started having the families pair off to play a couple rounds together.

Because of our tardiness we were the last family (I think it's good because we were the freshest on their minds as they were deliberating). We were VERY ENTHUSIASTIC by the time we went up there. We had been practicing our enthusiasm the entire time, so by the time we got up to bat we were very amped up. We were asked to name "a type of food you eat in slices." Cookie won the face-off giving the number one answer of "Pizza." Chris then answered with #5 -- "Pie" and I followed up with #3 -- "Bread." Efua guessed pineapples. It was a good answer but not on the board. Marc guessed apples. Good answer, but also not on the board. Cookie was back up and she sort of went blank. With time running out she guessed "fruit." She couldn't come up with anything more specific. The other family stole it with "cheese." Anyway, even though we lost that round we remained very supportive of one another and the other team and we were VERY ENTHUSIASTIC. The Studio guy who walked us out commented that we did very well with our enthusiasm. :) We were so enthusiastic that it took quite a while to come down from the high of playing.

Anyway, if they like us they'll send us a postcard in the next couple of days. If we haven't heard in 2 weeks, we didn't make the cut. Regardless of what happens, it was a really fun night. My siblings and I really bonded over the experience and if nothing else we were all VERY ENTHUSIASTIC.

Flying Solo

"No matter how calmly you try to referee, parenting will eventually produce bizarre behavior, and I'm not talking about the kids." ~Bill Cosby, Fatherhood, 1986

My beloved husband has left me for 10 days to visit his parents in Sydney. Since we've been together I've left him a few times to go to France, Spain, New York, New Orleans, and Seattle (the last one being since we got married), but he's never left me before. I have to say, it's much tougher being the one that's left. He just left yesterday and I'm already missing him terribly. I miss him when I'm the one that's gone too, but being away is more distracting. When you're the one that's home, you're constantly reminded that they're not there.

Anyway, last night was my first night as a single parent. I was on solo parenting duty. I was a little terrified that I would fail miserably at the task but everything went swimmingly. I made it home in time to relieve the baby sitter. I made a dinner that both kids enjoyed eating. I made sure the kids were bathed, cleaned up the dinner dishes, and got everyone in bed. That last one was a little challenging because they were both very excited with a new dance they were learning -- soulja boy dance -- and were more interested in dancing and telling the other one how little rhythm they had than they were in going to bed. But they did go to bed, with thoughts of soulja boys dancing in their heads, and woke up generally in a good mood. I got them to eat breakfast (no small feat), walked the dog, and got the kids to school on time. Phew! My only oopsie during the evening was that at one point I used an inappropriate word to refer to a body part -- a word that the 8-year old got quite a kick out of repeating. I eventually got him to stop and to realize that it's not a good word to say. So all's well that ends well.

Birthdays and Other Celebrations

“Who, being loved, is poor?” - Oscar Wilde

This post is going to be a big brag. I have to brag because these past few days have made me feel so beloved. First of all, five of the most gorgeous, generous, amazing women threw me a party on Saturday. The party was amazing... they really did it to the nines. They rented fancy linens and champagne flutes. They baked amazing deserts from scratch. They got fine champagne and decorated the house with champagne colored balloons. It was awesome. I felt very beloved by these women -- all representing different phases of my life (from college to the present). One of these women, Susan, flew all the way from Alabama just to throw me a party! And then there were the guests -- all sorts of people came to toast to Peter and I in our marriage. Again, I felt so very, very beloved and very honored. It was unbelievable.

Then yesterday was my birthday and the lovefest continued. I received all sorts of cards, phone calls, e-mails, flowers, gifts, etc. from friends and family near and far. But I also received happy birthday messages from all sorts of unexpected people from ex-boyfriends to ex-belly dancing teachers to ex-secretaries. It was incredible!

Then last night my family and my honorary family (my siblings, siblings-in-law, and best law school friends) took me out to dinner at Newsroom. There were 15 of us and our laughter rang out through the whole restaurant. As an aside, I highly recommend this restaurant. The food is very good and there are all sorts of healthy food options -- I was able to eat a raw salad and a vegan dessert. However, the meat eaters were also very happy with everything from New Zealand steak to Dehli prawns. Also, if you go you MUST eat the artichoke appetizer. It is beyond heavenly! Additionally, for those who get a kick out of star sightings, this place is also a very good place to go. I saw at least 2 movie stars there last night.

Anyway, I really resonate with the above Oscar Wilde quote. With all the love I've been shown in the past few days, I have to say I feel awfully rich.