Over the weekend I saw some friends, one of whom has children just a bit younger than mine. I was telling them, with no small amount of enthusiasm (fatal mistake!), how nice it is that I can now stay in bed a little while after the kids get up. I believe my exact words were, “Well, O. helps himself to as much candy as he wants. But what do I care, I’m sleeping in!”

Guess where O. went yesterday? The dentist. Guess what he has? TWO HUGE CAVITIES. Matching, one on either side of his mouth on two bottom molars.

Then, when we were scheduling the two (!) appointments for the fillings, the woman at the dentist’s office said that we could choose silver, for free, or tooth-colored, for $25 each. I was thrilled. Just $50 to cover up my huge parenting #fail? Sold!

But no. When you’re six years old, and you get the chance to have shiny silver teeth? You’re totally going for it. And your mom will be stuck looking at them for three or four or five years until the tooth fairy comes for them.

At the beginning of the year, Jeff received a personalized calendar from a vendor. We both thought this was a bit of an odd choice for a grown man. When is the last time anyone over 13 got excited about seeing their name spelled out in letters made of flamingos (May) or fireworks (January)? We’re all familiar with the power of mail-merge by now, and the personalization bloom is off the rose. Way off, given how much it’s abused by emailers who are lazy (“Dear Mommy Blogger”) or too quick with the trigger finger (“Dear <name>”).

But here’s a tip. If you are going to distribute a personalized calendar, one that says “Designed and produced especially for … ” at the bottom of every page in addition to the flamingos and whatever the heck?

You might want to make sure you are spelling the person’s name right. Or else he and his wife are going to laugh at you for an entire year, because his name is not JEFFERY.

One-oh-one, folks.

Sometime last month, one of favorite socks developed a big hole in the heel.

And there’s my winning entry for “most boring opening line of 2011″!

There is a definite pecking order in my sock drawer. Some are just better than others. They are softer, warmer, not too thick and not too thin. They don’t feel scratchy or bunch up under the arch of my foot. Many of them are from a batch I bought a year or two ago. So of course when I found the hole I thought “but these are NEW! Oh, the injustice!”

Two days after Christmas, when we went to the mall to exchange a few gifts and spend a few gift cards, I treated myself to six new pairs of socks. Six! I know! It gave me the same feeling I get when I finally bother to remove the chipped polish from my toes and put on a fresh coat.

That feeling, I have come to realize, is that I am human. Those comfortable, hole-free socks; those neatly polished toes–they remind me that I spent a few minutes and a few dollars on myself, just because I can and I should.

And you should too.

(Next up: Wantonly throwing the disliked socks into the rag bag!)

Regular readers will know that I am not by any stretch of the imagination a cook. I get by because I like to eat and I also have to feed my children. But I was pleased with how this little experiment turned out.

We had two spaghetti squash left over from our farm share. They have been sitting on the kitchen counter for weeks and weeks. As I was looking through the old CSA newsletters for a different recipe, I came across one for the squash. I adapted it based on the ingredients I had on hand.

Lasagna-Style Spaghetti Squash

1. Preheat oven to 325F. Cut squash in half lengthwise (this required a cleaver and pretty much all the strength in my upper body) and remove the seeds. You can reserve them for roasting if you are an overachiever. Spritz a baking sheet with a little oil and place squash halves on the sheet, cut side down.

2. Bake for about 35 minutes or until you can pierce the skin easily with a knife. The smaller of the two squash I had was done by this time, but the big one required another 10 minutes or so. Don’t turn off the oven.

3. Meanwhile, the recipe instructed, make your own tomato sauce with onion, garlic, stewed tomatoes, basil, a bouillon cube, and salt and pepper. I preferred to take a jar of marinara out of the pantry.

4. After the squash is cooked and cools down a bit, scrape the strands out into a bowl. Notice that the squash seems to have multiplied in volume about four-fold.

5. Put the now empty squash shells in a baking dish. Layer: tomato sauce, squash strands, [the recipe called for olives, no thank you], and shredded mozzarella cheese. I had some leftover spinach/ricotta mixture from some calzones we made earlier, so I put that in there between the squash and the mozzarella.

6. Keep going until you fill up the shells. Sprinkle on some parmesan if you have it. Bake for about 20 minutes or until the cheese melts on top.

I still have tons of cooked squash left, but I can reheat it with tomato sauce and more of the ricotta to approximate the above. Or I could take a smallish baking dish and redo the layers and bake like a regular lasagna. I can even throw in some of the leftover quinoa that’s also on hand. Whoa, somebody stop me from the leftover reusing!

I believe I am a social person–wouldn’t I have to be, to actually look forward to and enjoy a parent meeting at school, as I did last night? But I also require a lot of time alone. A lot, considering the two small children in my care, the husband, the school and community obligations, and so on. I am lucky enough to usually get enough of it, although I sometimes pay dearly in either child care dollars or missed sleep.

I love being at home alone, even though I don’t do anything more exciting than work or read blogs while my children are out at school. It’s just nice when all the interruptions are of my own making, and I get first crack at the refrigerator, and I can talk back to the radio or the Internet if I like.

I love being alone away from home too, especially while traveling. Now that I’ve traveled with kids, I appreciate every minute spent alone in an airport or airplane–minutes I can devote exclusively to my own reading or crossword-puzzling or iced-tea-drinking or even, let’s face it, toileting. Flight delay? If I have reading material and/or Internet access and enough snacks, bring it on. I will sit in this fake leather chair all day. (But could someone turn down the volume on that TV blaring CNN??)

Do you crave alone time more post-kids, if you have them? Do you ever get enough??

As part of her Suzuki music instruction, Jo is expected to practice her cello daily; and I am expected to observe that practice, along with her lessons. She loves to perform, but not so much with the practicing. We talked about this at length before agreeing to the lessons: that she’d have to practice, and she’d have to not whine about it.

How do you think that’s going so far?

Well, yeah. There is whining. But two things are helping.

The first is a tip I got from another parent at our school who is a piano keyboard helper like me. Actually, she’s a much better helper than I am because she stays for all the lessons and helps with them, too. So her advice was to let Jo choose, at the beginning of each practice session, what to focus on that day. Bow grip? Fingering? Moving the bow from the elbow, not the shoulder? And then we work  on that, just that. So I don’t spend the whole practice session saying “elbow up!” “Open A!” “Your bow is too high!” We are both much happier.

The second is that I realized I might as well get something out of all the time I am putting in observing lessons. So now I practice too (me and the 1/4 size cello!). And Jo stands in front of me saying “elbow up!” “Open A, not open D!” “Your bow is too high!”

Yup, both much happier. Twinkle, twinkle.

A few months ago Jeff suggested that we start having a regular family game night. Usually on Thursdays, we’d have pizza for dinner and then play a game. Board game, outdoor game, Wii game–all’s fair and we take turns choosing, even the grown-ups.

Frankly I thought it was a little dopey. We are fairly good at eating dinner together most nights, and after dinner we often spend more time together, just doing whatever (pause to say that even during the school year, there’s very little homework to deal with. Montessori FTW!). So, like, what would be the point of formalizing Family Game Night?

Well. The kids loooove it. They know that it happens on Thursday. They remind us that it’s coming. They remind us that it’s TONIGHT!!! Whoooo! Family Game Night!! They discuss whose turn it is to pick the next game (they keep track when I cannot). They sometimes even play the game without being sore losers.

So, ritual. Ritual and routine. Perhaps you’ve heard that children like them, even crave them? Family Game Night says yep, they do. You can bet on it.

Games we love:

• Uno
• Curious George Hide & Seek at the Zoo
• Monopoly Jr.
• Wii Fit Plus; now have Sports Resort on our wish list
• 10-4 Good Buddy: Awesome for teaching kids how to avoid speeding tickets
• The Tea Party Game (eeBoo)
• Charades

Jo wants to play Scrabble tonight. Attagirl!

A while ago, probably last summer, a friend gave me some beautiful file folders. I thought they were lovely but couldn’t quite imagine using them. I try to get rid of paper as soon as I can, by either recycling it, shredding it, or filing it if it must be saved. If something requires action, I try to take care of it quickly so I can then recycle, etc. Important stuff goes into a file box in the office. But if I used my pretty folders in there, I’d never see them, so what would be the point?

Meanwhile. I have trouble living up to my paperless ideal. I have this Pile. You know. You probably have one too. Bills that need to be paid, school forms, miscellaneous newspaper and magazine clippings. I move my pile from my workspace to the spare room and back again, repeatedly. I chip away at its contents, but like laundry, it always regenerates itself.

We solved half the Pile problem by mounting a calendar on the refrigerator–one that has large, rigid pockets for paper storage behind it. We use those for the papers we need to refer to often, but not save forever: the school lunch menu, invitations for upcoming events, the karate studio schedule, and so on.

But the other half of the Pile remained. Until I had my Eureka! moment. The file folders! I now have one for bills, one for fitness clips, and one for To Dos. The Pile is now a lovely stack of attractive folders. It’s a Prettier Pile.

And I am so, so pleased with myself.

I resisted Facebook for a long time. Mostly for the time suck factor, and partly because I was still holding a grudge about the breastfeeding thing. I finally succumbed late last year, under pressure from several family members and friends, as well as my own admission that I needed to use FB to help promote my fitness site.

Now that I’m there, I feel like I’ve stepped into a huge parallel world that I didn’t even know existed. The people, the lingo, the games–it’s like it’s related to the IRL world, but not quite. I discover new things (some savory, some not-so-) about people I’ve known for years and people I just met. I have relationships with people on FB that are completely different from those relationships outside of FB: I’m chatting far more often than I have in years with a friend from my NJ/NYC days, because we play Lexulous all the time. I had a nice conversation with a high school friend about his life as a stay-at-home dad. I keep up with a mom I knew from Jo’s school whose kids have since transferred to another building. I’ve learned about deaths, divorces, and new babies among my circle of acquaintances.

It’s odd. And it’s time-sucking. But so far, I’m clicking the “Like” button.

My recent trip was a rather in-your-face reminder of my lack of cool. Hanging out with a group of twentysomethings who love to snowshoe into the back country to snowboard, carrying ice picks and “avy” beacons, did not do wonders for the ego of this suburban mama.

My jeans are not cool. I only have one pair that doesn’t have a hole in the knee, and they are just a smidge too short and too light of a wash.

My snow pants are not cool (how could anything called “snow pants” be). I have the big, baggy, kiddie kind, not the sleek, stretchy, sexy kind.

My winter boots are so not cool that I left them behind in Colorado (they were also six years old and the zipper was starting to break).

My everyday winter coat is not cool. It’s as baggy as the snow pants and a really blah shade of gray. It’s also six years old and wasn’t even new when I got it. (My spring/fall coat, however, is cool. It’s turquoise with a Paul Frank monkey print lining the hood.)

My hair is not cool. I am starting to worry that it’s less “layered, longish bob” and more “mommy mullet.”

My car is not cool. I drive a dented station wagon.

I know nothing of the latest music or movies.

Even my phone is not cool (as Binkytowne will be happy to confirm). White, flip open, pay as you go, tap out a text message in 10 minutes, no data plan, for emergencies only.

But guess what? I’m moving into the ’00s. Yep. I got a smartphone. And you can read all about it.

And if you want to tell me how cool I am, or how uncool you are, that’d be cool, too.