Meals on Wheels Volunteering With Kids

I feel kinda bad this time around since all I do is sit on my butt while the kids do the meal deliveries. I don’t really know any of the people we’re delivering to, but once the weather gets nicer I’ll get all the kids out of the van and introduce us all proper-like. And the kids plan to start drawing or coloring pictures for all the people on our route (15 people, about 10 stops since some stops are husband/wife).

I do know that one of our stops has 10 grown kids! He called me a lightweight for only having 4 so far! Some of these people just want someone to talk to, and I wish I could chat with them all day.

I honestly tear up when I see these people open the door with such delight when they see Joel with their food. So my heart melts about 10 times every Friday, which makes me highly recommend anyone doing a Meals on Wheels route.

Michael doesn’t want much to do with the deliveries since he’s not so social, but Joel (and sometimes Callie) does a great job and learns a lot about who gets what kind of food (one hot tray and one cold bag to each house; some get a diet tray instead; some get 2 frozen meals to tide them over for the weekend). Someday soon it will also be a great homeschool lesson in maps, geography and navigation.

Often a client’s son will meet us outside to take the meal, and I think that maybe someday my kids will be hanging out with me on a Friday either waiting for my Meals on Wheels lunch or making me something.

All 4 of my grandparents are 80 or almost-80 now, and they are all able to cook for themselves still or, in the case of my mom’s parents, hit the Taco Bell out in the country every other day. I pray there will always be someone to take care of them and make their meals for them and be a source of company.

And please don’t leave me comments about how great I am for volunteering for Meals on Wheels … I do it because Joel really wanted to and I want him to see how great the elderly can be. When he gets in the car after a delivery he always says, “She/he was really nice.”

Here’s your mission: Appreciate the people in your life, even the crotchety, grumpy, judgmental ones. Seek to understand why they act the way they do (e.g., living with chronic pain or watching all your friends die first can’t be fun), and try to love them anyway.

Recent Purchase: Diaper Bag

Ah, LandsEnd.com. How I love you. I’m not usually a shopper in general (especially at full price), and especially not on the Internet because I like to try it before I buy it, but now I am a believer. A few weeks ago my red-headed sister-in-law (and ex-roommate, God help her) came into town. She had a cool bag from Lands End, but it wasn’t big enough for my needs for a diaper bag.

Remember I cloth diaper, so I have to fit a few of those thick suckers in a bag, plus wipes, medicine bag, butt cream, baggies for dirty diapers, wallet, gum, suckers, chapsticks and lip glosses, plus Post-its, pens, chocolate, Advil, a spiral notebook, a magazine or two, extra clothes for Eva and about 10 other things I’m forgetting. I’m a just-in-case gal, especially since I have little kids. It drives Aron NUTTY that I end up with a 10-pound diaper bag (and that’s on a light day!). Usually, I end up not carrying it for long; it has a spot of honor in the front seat of the double stroller most times so I can easily get to anything I need.

Sooo, my SIL and I go online and I order a bigger version with a zipper (and BOY, is it big!) in brown and orange (not my first choice, but retro enough to make me happy). Oh, and I got my name put on it! So now when I’m out brand-new stalkers will know my name! I kinda wish they had a size in between Medium and Humongous, but I’ll take what I can get. Can’t send it back now!

I know what my dad will say when he sees it: “Wow, my mail satchel was smaller and lighter than that and I had to carry it for 30 years.”

Aron says he could drive his truck into the new diaper bag.

A Great Playdate

There’s just something about a great playdate that makes the world seem rosier.

Recently I went to the house of a friend for the first time. We knew each other through homeschool groups, and she’d been to my house years ago. We’d talked on the phone and on Facebook.

I almost didn’t go because I got a migraine on the way over (spots that prevented me from seeing the street signs … it’s a wonder I even found her house). But I plowed on … for the sake of the “socialization” of my homeschooled kids.

Once there, I dug through my monster diaper bag for some Advil and came up empty. My friend gave me not only Advil, but also some Coke (I need the caffeine for the migraine) and she had ordered pizza for us and the kids. We left after 2 hours, which Joel hated because he was having fun. Even Callie was warming up, but Michael was stuck to me the whole time, and the baby was getting tired. I didn’t want to overstay my welcome, but usually we’ll stay all afternoon on a playdate if everyone’s hitting it off.

Anyway, they are transportation-challenged currently, so we made plans for her 3 oldest kids to get to my house one day the following week to play for the WHOLE AFTERNOON. My friend would get hours to herself with only her 3-year-old to care for while I would get friends for MY kids. Everyone is happy.

Now I envision the future: we will be best friends. Our kids will be best friends. She won’t go all Catholic-psycho on me like 2 other women have in that homeschool group. She likes Harry Potter, so already we have that naughty secret. I see them coming over for cookouts and picture our husbands having a beer and laughing heartily over Obama’s latest antics.

A friend for me who does not have a homeschool schedule or keep an immaculate home! Friends for my kids! A potential friend for my husband! I am giddy!

Old Picture Tuesday … Prom

This was taken in my backyard right before my Junior Prom, the only one I attended. I wish Rachel Zoe had been around then to be my personal stylist. She would’ve told me that dress was not very flattering on my body. It had a big white bow that covered my chest that I ripped off. I think I should’ve left it on!

My date picked me up (along with his friend and his friend’s date, a flippin’ FRESHMAN) and we went to Fedora on the Country Club Plaza. I immediately lost one of my Lee press-on nails at dinner. We hit the dance (in our school gym) for maybe 30 minutes, then met a bunch of people back at my date’s house to just hang out. Nothing exciting at all, believe me. I wasn’t drunk and I was home by midnight.

As for Senior Prom, I bought 2 tickets, a gorgeous white-with-diamond-accents dress and was going to take my 21-year-old boyfriend, but he never intended to go in the first place and chose to work that night instead (a waiter at Bennigan’s). Once I figured this out, I started calling every guy I knew looking for SOMEONE to take me. And yes, I called Paul, who already had TWO dates to something else the same night (mimbo!). That night I ended up going dancing at the Varsity Club, an under-21 dance club, and that was about it. I liked driving around by myself in my 1978 yellow Chevette a lot back in those days. I was home at an extremely respectable hour.

Does the word PROM strike fear and bad memories in your heart or was it one of the best nights of your life?

Weight Watchers Points

I know you don’t have to spend money to lose weight. In fact, you should be SAVING money when you lose weight because you are eating LESS. And walking is free. So are exercise DVD rentals from the library. Still, I’ve always found Weight Watchers to be quite motivating. It worked great for me for a few months back in 2006. Then I gave up.

I tried again after Eva was born, but I think it was too early and I was starving all the time from breastfeeding and wasn’t able to make the meetings with a tiny baby nursing and trying to sleep (and another child wanting to tag along) and wasn’t able to leave the baby at home because I’m a freaky attached mommy.

When my youngest just turned 1, I did WW again and lost a few pounds. It motivates me knowing someone will be weighing me in on the same scale every single week. Of course, every time I lose some weight, I get pregnant again. But for a few weeks (before I knew I was pregnant) I was my own little Food Dictator and monitored all that went into my mouth and went all Diet Coke and Splenda (yes, poison, I know) and people rolled their eyes at me, but I DID IT FOR ME and didn’t care what anyone else thought.

So how do you stop using food as your drug of choice? It always helps me when I’m stressed out. It’s better for me than cigarettes or Ritalin or tequila, right? Safer, anyway, I guess. I’m like a drug addict on Celebrity Rehab when I try to lose weight. I just KNOW this time will be the time I will kick my food addiction. But then somehow I always end up with needles – I mean, Dove chocolates – in my back pocket or diaper bag.

How do you learn Food Appreciation versus Food Inhalation? How do you live mindfully and EAT mindfully? And no, I’m not letting pregnancy be an excuse to start pigging in tons of chocolate again. I have relapsed a couple of times with vanilla Coke and Hershey’s extra creamy hearts (who knew?), but this time around I can eat 2 hearts and be happy rather than eating 20 and being able to taste ONE of them.

Next week we’ll talk about your Weight Loss Influences (friends, family, etc.). Don’t worry, I’m tiring of the weight loss thing, so suffer through with me for a few more weeks!