Kicking myself on the shelf

Thousands of us have done it.

It's a lot of fun! They said
The kids will love it! They said
It's easy! They said
The elf just sits on the shelf and moves from place to place each night...

I should have know better. They are always telling lies.

Like so many before me. I made the mistake of inviting elves to live in my house for the weeks before Christmas. Elves that watch the kids all day, then fly home to Santa to tattle at night.

No common over marketed elf for my children. Nana had 3 elf friends born about the same time she was, so with her help, they came live with us.

At first they were great. Moving happily around the house. Delighting the children and parents alike.
But soon they got lazy, or tired. Let's be fair. It's a busy friggin time for elves. Their heads are over run with super important nonsense. Like which day is pyjama/ugly sweater/dress like a reindeer day at school, or what they gave the bus driver for Christmas last year. So the unthinkable happens.

Let me play it out for you;

The children run down the stairs to see where the elves have landed. 

Mom notices they haven't moved since yesterday...or was it the day before.

Children use perfected 'disappointment eyes' to stab said Mother in the heart.

Mom explains that "our elves are older than other peoples elves, moving is harder for them. Sometimes when they find a spot they like, they might just stay there for a couple days and rest."

The next few days are great. Elves move. The everyone's happy.

Then one of the children comes home to share what little Susie's elf does...

No one tells you when you invite an elf into your house that you are entering a parenting competition. You think they are just going to plop from place to place in your house. You should have been paying better attention on Facebook.

It's time to call it out. SOME PEOPLE are helping their elves. There is no way that an elf can get into some of the situations I've seen on my Facebook newsfeed.

Elsa froze your elf in a block of ice? Really?

Your elf cut out 4000 paper snowflakes and decorated your entire main level? Really?

Let's not get into the questionable relationship your elf is in with Barbie...

15 Christmas' from now I will be sitting at the supper table with my children. They will be reminding me of how in 2014 our elves didn't show up at all. Or how Molly the dog got the littlest's elf and ate his hat before someone noticed. One of these children will have had their own children, so I will share with them that I still have the contact information for the 3 geriatric elves of their youth. Then I will set it up that the little a-holes are distributed to live with them.

That first morning the elves arrive they will get to see the joy in their children's faces.
I will be sitting, giggling at my own house knowing what is coming.

Sitting in my own quiet house.
Sitting in my too quiet house, where I can remember how soon my own children became too old to care about elves and Santa and the small joys of Christmas...

Dangit. Now I have to go cut 4000 snowflakes.

Too many roosters

How many roosters do you see in this picture?

The Answer. Too many.

Here in lies the problem of the 'non-farmer-like' chicken farmer. Should you hatch a collection of eggs, some will be born roosters. In our case. Most will be born roosters.

While this is essentially losing in the chicken genetic lottery. There are many perks to raising a flock of predominately male poultry. 

1) You never need to worry about sleeping past 5:30am.

2) They are happy to provide exercise for the dog.

3) They look pretty....

However as the fall gets colder and the risk of being charged for running a Cock Fighting operation increases, the option of ignoring this situation is getting a little less feasible.

So...more good news. FREE ROOSTERS! 

Everyone needs a rooster. 

Remember 1992 when roosters graced many a kitchen décor item? You miss those days. Don't you?

Let me tell you about a few of your bachelor options

Bachelor number 1 - Bob. Bob is modelling for you the tradition rooster garb. Ever popular in Chinese food restaurant, Bob will add the Feng Shui to your yard.

Bachelor Number 2 - Foxy. Last week Foxy had a tail... He doesn't like to talk about his near death experience. We kindly ask that you don't bring it up while he waits for his prosthetic to arrive.

Bachelor Number 3. Donald. Donald is in love with a duck. He is enthusiastically working to create a new breed of 'Chucks'. But we don't judge. Love is love Donald.

Bachelor number 4 is Chip. Born looking like a chipmunk. He doesn't say much. 

We think he may have a mouthful of nuts.

Bachelor Number 5 is Pat. Pat is gender confused. Chicken on the front. Rooster on the back.  Exotic and rare. Pat has no time for pictures.

Bachelor Number 6 is Molly. A more appropriate name would likely have been Elvis, or King as he's king of the castle around here. But apparently it's Molly, as he comes every time we call the dog.

So I know what you are thinking. It's my lucky day. I'm getting a free rooster! 

But call now. This is a limited time offer. 

Operators are standing by to take your call.

1-800-whatwasIthinking

Have you seen my bum?

Excuse me. I know you are busy but I have lost something very important to me. It seems I have misplaced my bum.
I am not looking for my circa 1996, 19 year old bum. Only the one that I possessed at the beginning of the summer. A recent cold snap sent me into jeans that seem to have shrunk in the closet. As did the next pair...and the next. I have come to the conclusion that somewhere in the last 2-3 months I must have set down my bum and picked up someone else's. This one doesn't fit me.

I am mentally retracing my July & August steps.

• Maybe I left it at the gym? No I put my gym membership on hold of the summer. That can't be it.
• Maybe it's in the one of the lawn chairs? I clearly remember sitting it there many times with a bag of chips.
• Maybe it's with the empty red wine bottles? There seems to have grown quite a collection.

Truly it's a mystery. 

Should you see my bum, could you please let it know that I miss it and I would like it back. We have a cruise planned together for October and I'm worried the port authorities are going to think I'm trying to smuggle in a bag of fish.

Why I do "home parties"

I've worked with hundreds of people in the last five years as a business coach. Never have I sat down with someone that has said  "I really want to do home parties" or "As a child I dreamed about going into peoples homes to share with them a product I believe in". Much more likely, the concern "Do I HAVE to parties?" is voiced.

I confess I was part of the later group. When I considering joining the company I currently represent it was my biggest stumbling block. Although I couldn't put my finger on why. There was something about that idea that made me feel uncomfortable.

I had been given a pull to check out the business and I was desperate to change my life. So I accepted that I might have to do group presentations and I dipped my toe into the business. I was surprised by what I found. Not only did I enjoy meeting new people in a relaxed environment, I learned so much.

Do you know what this is?

I didn't, until Wednesday when the host at my presentation served it. The same night a guest taught me a cool eye make up trick with scotch tape and how to pronounce the Ł in Polish.

In the five years I have been in Network Marketing it has grown in many ways. Home presentations are now only one of the tools we have to reach new customers. Several effective reach out methods have been added in response to our societies increasingly busy lives. In fact in my personal business these events only make up a small portion of my activity. 

Once my biggest concern, group presentations are now among the things I look forward to the most. I meet people that I never would have and learn the coolest things. 

If you are still wondering what that fruit is, check out  http://www.wikihow.com/Eat-a-Persimmon

We manifested a cat

In our house I have been working to get across the idea that 'thoughts are things', the premise behind the 1937 book Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill . It's important to me that the kids understand that we can have control over our thoughts and what they think about will come about.

I didn't know they heard me.

Earlier this week a kitten was dropped off at our house. We were sitting on the lawn trying to befriend him and decide what we should do when my 13 year old spotted a bucket a baseballs that we had purchased from a friend on the weekend. "Holy Smokes Mom. We manifested a cat!"

Here lies the problem. I didn't read the parenting chapter on that. So my mind was instantly a muck with 

• He listens?
• What if he's afraid to bring anything into his life with a picture?
• Should I tell him he's right...that he's wrong?
• This is why people don't discuss this shit with kids.

I decided to implement the well used laugh and deflect technique practised for generations of parents without the right answer. 

We will revisit this conversation after I figure out what to do with this cat...

There is a chicken in my bra

I had the wonderful opportunity to grow up on a hobby farm. As a child I had my own horse and the barn was full of donkeys, goats, chickens, rabbits, sheep, ducks, a lama, a couple cows and I'm sure many more critters that I have forgotten about. We used to say that if it was legal for my Mother to buy it, it lived on our farm.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

Four years ago at a petting zoo one of my darling children looked up at me and said "Mom is that a goat or a deer?"
What happened in my head at that moment was a bit like a submarine sinking scene in a movie. Flashing red lights and horns were saying WARNING. WARNING. YOU ARE FAILING AS A PARENT. You are raising THAT CHILD.
That child was the kid that would come to our farm to visit and would run and cry when a bunny hopped in his direction. Even though I am aware that I am messing my kids up somehow, there was no way I was raising that child.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

I set about to right this wrong by creating our own little farm environment by getting a dozen chickens. Living on a single acre on the edge of town and wanting to stay married, this seemed like the best option. That was three years ago. The chicken adventures were many and our flock of 12 dwindled to three geriatric old hens.

 Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

The plan was to get 12 new eggs and an incubator to restock our little flock. But I made the grave mistake of taking the children with me to the farm to pick them up.
So far we've hatched 24 chickens and a duck.

 Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

24 chickens and 1 odd duck live in a box in my office, safe from the dog. All but one hatched themselves in regular bird fashion. The one we call Miracle didn't. She pipped her hole in the shell, then struggled for 24 hours to make any further progress. I googled. I helped. I shouldn't have.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

Miracle is tiny, half the size of the rest of the chicks. We didn't think she'd live past the first day. Which is how she found her name. As in "It will be a miracle if this one lives". The amazing part is that even though she is tiny, she is LOUD. She never shuts up unless someone is holding her. I think now Miracle is more a reflection on the fact that no one has wrung her little neck.

I have work to do today in the office I share with 23 chicks, a duck and the worlds loudest miracle chicken. I don't possess a chicken bjorn.

Which is why I am currently typing with a chicken in my bra.

Jimmy Coo vs. Air Canada

There is a battle going on that few people know about. The airlines are conspiring against the shoe companies by setting ridiculously low weight allowances on luggage, limiting the number of shoes that women can pack during travel.

This is why I am incredibly grateful for business partners with the same shoe size. I didn't plan it that way. I didn't find shoes clustered around a doorway at an event, peak inside, then recruit those that put the same size as me. Shoe size isn't on any questionnaires my future business partners fill out. It wouldn't matter if it was, because people are foot liars. Men lie up and women lie down. This in one of the many things I learned during my highschool career as a Joggers shoe salesperson.

Sometimes luck is in your favor and you can collect a tribe of fellow size 9ers to travel with. All feeling secure in the knowledge that you are going to be able to bail each other out when the shoes you were planning for a big event while traveling over time zones, morphed into something uncomfortable and hideous.

It's just good shoe math.

A selfie stick IS a business tool

When you are born right after Christmas your birthday loses some excitement. Celebrate it 38+ times and the gratitude for being allowed another is gift enough. This year was different though. When my husband asked what I would like for my birthday. I answered right away. "A selfie stick!".

I watched my darling husband fight an internal battle on how to react. He almost hid his horror and concern as he cautiously answered "really?". I confidently answered "As a business tool".

Now if you have been blessed to be with someone more than half your life, like we have. You know when to ask more questions and when to move on. A selfie stick arrived cheerfully wrapped on my birthday.

I know he doesn't get it. He has an office and co workers he sees every day. When you work from home as an Independent Consultant it's different. We only get together a couple times a year, so it's exciting, fun and fills your cup.

You want to capture that shit. 

No that's not my hero biscuit

I lost my opportunity for the ultimate Mom hero biscuit when I opted in for drugs during the c-section births of my three children, hanging her head in shame. So I'm not sure why medicating myself to get on a plane feels so dirty. I know passenger 12B in the seat beside me doesn't care when I sneak in my tiny pill, but they should. I could introduce them to young airline mechanic that was seated beside me a few years ago on a return flight. I grabbed him so suddenly and tightly during some turbulence that I felt I should write an apology letter to his Mother.

I've read the stats and know that I am technically safer in the air than I am in the car on way to the airport but here's my trouble with flying. I've run into enough people in different fields that are terrible at their job, that it is not a big leap to think that perhaps I might have a bad pilot. Now before you start in on the comments section, I know that planes are largely flown by computers and more than 1 pilot, so it takes a large collection of errors and factors to crash a plane. But it happens and when it does it's all over the media, like a giant beacon of warning to the fair weather flyer's like me.

Ironically I love to travel and take at least 6-8 flights a year. So I have developed a system that you are welcome to borrow.

Step 1- Set alarm, and wake frequently to make sure the hydro has not gone out.
Step 2 - Give up on sleep and have 2 coffees before leaving the house. Pack one for en route.
Step 3 - Arrive at the airport ridiculously early so to ensure enough time to elevate the anxiety levels.
Step 4 - Talk to every member of the airport staff to get a read on whether 'something is up' or not.
Step 5- Start process of bi-hourly peeing. Get another coffee.
Step 6 - Check out each passenger in the waiting area for signs of unstable behaviour.
Step 7 - Listen for boarding call. Contemplate leaving the airport.
Step 8 - Cautiously board plane, being sure to make eye contact with all attendants and peer into the cockpit to watch for shiftiness in the pilots.
Step 9 - Find seat and text a goodbye to all those you love before shutting down your phone.
Step 10- Resign yourself to the fact your life might be over. Repeat, "Let go. Let God", until your plane has levelled off.
Step 11- Land safely. Make mental notes regarding all promises made to your higher power and feel silly about Steps 1 -10.

You're welcome. j

"Tony! Tony! Come around."

"Something's lost and must be found!" I was taught you only call St.Anthony in for the big stuff.

 18 hours before getting on a plane and my car keys were gone. Compound the problem by the fact that we live 2 hours from the airport and I am to drive my business partner as well, and we have a problem.

The first few hours of looking were marked by annoyance and minor barking at the family to assist or get out of the way. I've never seen them move so fast when the school bus arrived.  As each place that the keys "should be" was searched my panic level increased. Six hours in I was a full blown crazy woman. I checked the trees outside. In my mind a squirrel picking up my dropped keys and using the colourful lanyard as nesting made complete sense.

Insert on the scene friends and family that called or stopped by to say goodbye before my trip. As my plight became apparent they offered super helpful advice like "Did you check where you usually put them?" "Maybe they are still in the car?" "Wow, I bet those keys are really expensive to replace!". These remarks allowed me to practice my life long goal of holding my sarcastic tongue. Of which I am not always successful.

8 hours into the search and I had to allow myself to think about what the heck we were going to do if they didn't turn up. Clearly they weren't in the garbage, in any nook/cranny of the house and they weren't in the trees. They were gone.

The children cautiously arrived home from school asking if they were found. I'm sure my frazzled and exhausted appearance answered for me. I had just confessed the situation to my travel partner and had answered my husbands 7th text of "Found them yet?" with a resigned "No :( ". I begged the kids to check their backpacks. Which of-course was met with protests that I had made them do it before leaving in the morning. That was until they were located. In the backpack that was checked 8 hours of searching ago...

There's an Elephant in my workspace.

I'm wrestling with a giant elephant who just won't listen to reason. Here's the conversation we have been having for over a week.

Elephant "I want some attention"
Me "I really want to spend some time with you, but I have a lot of work to do before I leave for my conference"
E - "But I am important too"
M - "You can wait. I need to be practical."
E - "What are you doing? Is that Facebook? That can't be work."
M- "Making use of social media is part of my job and it's none of your business anyway."
E -  " Hello...."
M- " Piss off."
E - " How about just a few minutes?"
M - "You know what that will lead to. It will be two hours, the kids will be home and I won't have got my work done."
E - " You suck. Other women balance way better"
M - "That was low. Have some class."
E- "I'd be way classier if you finished painting me. Just sayin."

Ducks in a Row

Someone tell me why it is so important that all the sheets have been changed on the beds before I get on a plane? Does the wall behind the stove need to be scrubbed? Of-course it does. Can you only imagine if people showed up to my grieving families home after my plane crashed to find dust and dirt. Oh the shame.

I have a completely capable family that are able to tidy up after themselves and do not spend much time thinking about the cleanliness of their sheets. However right before I leave for a trip I morph into this obsessive compulsive clean freak.

Plus my colleagues are ridiculously attractive people. Which brings a challenge for someone who's great clothing aspirations include clean Lulus and has the ability to grow Muppet-like eyebrows overnight. In the next three days I will be plucked, coiffed, painted and fitted in my best effort to blend.

I'm acutely aware that I am difficult to be around at the moment. My children are strangely out of sight and my husband looks like he is trying not to make any sudden movements. There is a definite air of 'don't let the door hit you on the way out' in Martinville. It makes me hopeful that the sense of relief, will over ride any missing of Mom.

While writing this I started to wonder if other women suffer from
PreTripGetAllYourDucksInARowandForGoodnessSakedosomethingwithThoseEyebrowsMomisits. I'll save you some time. I googled it. The answer is no. Which means that adding it's entry in urbandictonary.com, just made it to my pre-trip to do list.

Do I need to introduce myself if only my Mother is reading this?

10 000 people start blogs every day. Or is it 17 000? I have no idea. I'm just pulling both numbers out of the air, but it's a lot. Most will post a few times and lose interest. Such is human nature. Personally, I've started 4 blogs and only ever published 1 post. I suppose it's the same reason we join a gym with great expectations of getting fit, go 4 times the first week, 2 times the second week and by the third are finding a new route to work so that we don't have to pass the god-forsaken place.

So I'm wondering if I should bother introducing myself. Since only my Mother will be reading this post and she's knows more about me than a sane person would post about them-self on the internet.

I do feel I should warn you. If you plan to continue reading you need to accept two things. Most of my life is spent trying to find a way to get some work done from home, stay married and not beat the kids. That's about as exciting as it gets. I'm not an undercover spy. I'm not working my way through the worlds most famous french cookbook, one recipe at a time. I'm just rolling along an average sort of life, looking for sunshine and trying to bring some value to the rest of the world. Oh and if grammar is your thing. run. away.

If by chance you are reading this and you aren't my Mom. Go check her out. Let's be honest here, she's way smarter and more interesting than me. www.evscott1.blogspot.ca

In love, learning and sunshine, j