Mid-CenturyModernMoms

Holiday Stress - update

So despite the pre-holiday meltdown and drama my sisters created, Jen and Becca and I had a great Thanksgiving lunch with Drew, and a lovely Thanksgiving dinner with my parents, family and friends.    I don't think it's a bad thing for two college girls to split their holiday between two sets of relatives, and I think my daughters enjoyed being with Drew's family no matter what they told their aunts. There was no drama at either  home Thursday, though my sisters...let's just say the weekend did not resemble Thursday at all....

 

Becca spent most of the weekend working!  The job she had at the mall last year -- well, she can work there anytime she wants, and she wound up taking shifts Wednesday, Friday (Black Friday shopping!), Saturday and Sunday.  Nice paycheck for that, I'm sure.    Considering that she doens't work while at school, the money will come in handy.  Of course, she made time for her  social life -- or rather, her boyfriend...

 

Jen, on the other hand, spent her time taking care of chores - like servicing her car, going to the dentist, getting her hair done -- as well as catching up with her friends.  She doesn't have a retail job around here, she's got a job at college, as a teaching assistant in an elementary school. 

 

I think Jen is starting to really understand why I ask her to call me after she drives back up to school, that there's a reason I ask her to check in when she gets back to school.  All weekend long I told her "It's not your driving that worries me, it's the morons on the road who scare me."  Sunday night, as she was driving back to school, she narrowly avoided an accident.  The car directly in front of her hit the car in front of him -- but thanks to her ABS brakes and a quick reaction time, Jen avoided hitting the other two cars.  She had to pull over to the side of the road to make sure her car was all right (and, I suspect, to regain her composure), but she drove away unscathed.  Must have been scary...

 

They just went back to school, but I am already missing my girls.  Tonight is the first night of Chanukah, and for the first time in their lives, neither of my daughters will be home for the holiday.  I sent them off to school with electric menorahs and lots of chocolate coins and dreidels, of course, but ...sigh....

 

 

 

 

cross posted at Songbird's Crazy World

Bits and Pieces

Today's post is just bits and pieces of news.

Abe is doing a fantastic job of helping out when Rosie needs to be picked up or needs a ride someplace and I can't or don't want to do it.  This past week there has been a lot of that.

One of the pick ups was when Rosie took the PSAT this past week.  She had been really worried about it beforehand, but afterwards said that it was easy.

Rosie is getting into college search mode.  We went to a college fair last week.  This put a bunch of new colleges on her list to look at, and even took a few off.  Why off?  One of the questions that we asked the college reps was about the jewish life on campus.  In a few cases, we were told that there is essentially none.  So off they went.

Rosie continues to be lovingly close to me.  I told her that I got dumped by my boyfriend and got a big hug and kiss from her.  She could see that I was NOT devastated by this- he hadn't been a keeper, but it certainly had been nice to be going out and doing things with another adult.

An All in the Family Wedding

We just went to a family wedding. 

Actually, we just were all in a family wedding.

Mom's first cousin, Jon, was finally getting married after years and years of talking about it (I think it's been under discussion for over 4 years!)

Nina, the bride, has bonded into our family and the wedding party is primarily composed of family members; her sons by a previous marriage, Rosie and Abe as attendents, Zeyde (Jon's uncle) as the best man and Ora as the maid of honor.

Why do I get the honor of primary female attendent?  I was the one who kept pushing for them to get married.

But to start off the weekend, Rosie got in more than 2 hours of highway driving (each way).  She drove us out to the western part of the state (and back)- and did a very nice job of it-even in heavy traffic at times in both directions.  She also finished her drivers' ed lessons and started the actual driving lessons part this past week.

But back to the wedding.  Nina decided that she wanted a 1920s (or 30s or 40s) themed wedding.  It was based on the fact that I had a gorgeous flapper dress that I had gotten for Rosie's Bat Mitzvah party, and it went from there.  Her boys were in Zoot suits & zeyde wore an old-fashioned style tuxedo. The groom wore white tux and the bride was in a traditional wedding gown.

And Rosie wore a teal dress with old-time styling. 

 
 But I knew that Abe wouldn't be comfortable in a Zoot suit, so he wore his grey suit, with a shirt and tie to coordinate with his sister. 

And everyone was beautiful!!  And a wonderful time was had by all.  And Abe actually socialized and talked to people- especially at the rehearsal dinner before he was all socialized out!  But boy, are we all tired!

New Beginnings

The new Jewish year has truly been a new beginning for our family.  In the same week as Rosh Hashanah, Abe started college and Rosie started her junior year of high school (read the crunch year).  And in the few weeks before that, the car that Abe had been driving quit and we had to get a new old car for him quickly, and there was a quick trip to California for a wedding. Rosie continued seeing and her camp boyfriend and Ora started a relationship too.

So a lot has changed for us.  Hopefully you'll excuse me for not having written in a few weeks.

Abe is doing pretty well at college, but he just got hit with a writing assignment- and writing is NOT his strength.  He got one paragraph done on it and then sat spinning his wheels.  I suggested that he go to the writing lab for help in between classes, but he instead went off to find a quiet place.  I'll have to find a way of getting him to get the help he desperately needs for writing.

This isn't a new problem, by any means, but I don't think that he realizes how big a problem it really can be even for someone in engineering or computers.

Rosie is already stressed out by school.  To start with, she didn't get into the ceramics class that she wanted.  She hates the teacher that she got and hasn't been able to transfer to the one that she likes.  Turns out that almost everyone is transferring out of this teacher's class!

And now she's going to transfer down out of Honors Biology into standard college prep Bio.  She thinks that she's a failure and is comparing herself against friends who are in 4 Honors classes, while she'll only be in Honors Math.

Considering that math was NOT my best subject, I'm pretty sure that my little girl will still get into top rated colleges and be able to study whatever she wants to do.  Something that she's not at all certain about right now.  But in her, I see myself at that age- certain that my life choices depend on the choices that I was about to make right at that time!

Another new beginning, was the wedding that we went to in California.  It was totally stressful to just go for the weekend, but we didn't want to miss more of work or school.  But the wedding was wonderful (if not exactly our style) and we love the groom (a cousin) and are growing to love the bride.  And it was great to see so much family all in one place- including a 100 year old patriarch!

But our beginnings have been hectic.  I hope that the next few weeks settle down a bit.

unbelievable

Not only do you have to worry about the way your child drives....you also have to worry about all the other morons on the road.

Once again I am dealing with insurance adjusters, tow trucks, body shops, accident reports....

Jen was broadsided as she was pulling out of a parking lot onto the roadway. Jen says the other car came out of nowhere, that she looked both ways before pulling out of the lot and didn't see anyone coming. The guy who hit her says he was doing 30 MPH....but the damage to her car makes me doubt it. The accident happened just south of a very busy intersection, and my guess is that he wanted to make it through the intersection before the light changed.  And, oh yeah, the guy who hit her is NOT a teen driver...he's older than I am.  

I keep telling both girls "Drive as if everyone else on the road is a moron, because most of them are."

And now we have to figure out how Jen is going to get to work while her car is in the shop.

My insurance wasn't high enough, I had to have this happen now?

Calgon take me away.

Surprises

This has been a week of surprises.  Some surprises are good, and others are not.  We've had both this week.

The first surprise was with the car that Abe has been driving.  I had called him to make sure that he had done something and he told me (CALMLY) instead that several warning lights had come on in the car's dashboard.  Well, it is 9 years old, but I had just had the battery replaced and they told me that it was good for a while longer.  (I didn't know that they only meant a few months!!)

So I gave him the phone number to the dealer and told him to bring it over there.  I met him there and after we went out for a bite to eat, we found out that it needed over $5000 worth of work.  And, that they weren't even recommending that we do it!  Eek.  Abe needs a car to drive to school with in the fall!

So that was (bad) surprise #1.  But it was also a good surprise in that Abe reacted very calmly and correctly.

Then another surprise.  Rosie wrote me a letter from camp actually admitting that she had a boyfriend.  Sharing that information with mom was a lovely, good surprise present.

So back to the car.  I posted on the internal bulletin board a query whether anyone had a car to sell- and good surprise #3- someone did!  Low money, about the same age as the other car, but lower mileage.

Can you say rollercoaster week?

Visiting Day

Rosie has been away at camp for a month- with another month to go.  It's her last summer as a camper.  And she is determined to eke out every last iota of enjoyment from it.

But last week I got to see her and give her a hug.  It was visiting day at camp.  It's the end of first session and the kids that stay both sessions (as is mandatory for these oldest campers) get to see people from outside- and more importantly, they get to go out of camp themselves.

There is a tradition at this camp.  Take the kid to Wal-Mart and re-stock up on junk food and anything else that the kid needs.  Not too bad a bill this year.  And give hugs to all of your friends that you see at the store (as if you hadn't been living with these people!)  And then go to one of the two Friendly's for lunch (ditto on seeing the camp kids) and then go to the local homemade ice cream stand (moo).

So we did all that.  And walked around the area that her group is bunked in and got to see her own section of it.

Mom got a huge hug at the beginning of the visit.  But by the end, Rosie was off and running to her friends.

And three weeks to go.

auto shopping

So last week I mentioned that Jen was involved in an accident, that her air bag deployed and that she walked away without a scratch.

The same cannot be said of her car.

I bought the car two years ago, right after Jen got her driver's license.  Paid $2500 for a 1996 Chevy Cavalier -- the car had 150,000 miles on it, but the engine had been replaced when the car had only 70,000 miles on it (that must have been a story!).  I expected the girls to share the car, I never expected Jen to need a car at college, and I expected the car to last about 3 years, maybe 4 if we got lucky.  (I don't believe in buying brand new, expensive cars for teenagers, even if I could afford it....which I can't.)

Well, when Jen called me and told me that she had an accident with the car and that the airbag went off....I knew even before I saw the car that it was time to say goodbye to the Chevy.

So now she is without wheels.  and she needs a car.  She's got to drive to the local college for her summer class right now, in a few weeks she'll start her summer job, and when she goes back to school in the fall she will be living off campus --- and there's no public transportation.

In other words, she needs a car.

She's about to take another step towards becoming a self-sufficient adult.  She is buying a car of her own.  I'm giving her a little money, and her father is giving her some as well, but the balance will come from her savings account -- all those summers of hard work are about to pay off.  Of course, I agreed to put the car -- whchever car she chooses -- on my insurance policy (but only after she agreed to take a defensive driving class to lower my premium). 

so yes, that's my daughter over at the used car lot, looking at cars in her price range, learning terms like "carfax",  deciding which automotive features are "must haves" and which she can live without.  Her money, her decision.

Of course, that she decided to bring her aunt (affectionately known in legal circuits as "the pit bull") to negotiate the price...well, that shows she's using her head, doesn't it?

Wish her luck on her search, ok?

Freewheeling

First she has to get a pillow to sit on.

Then she reaches down and pulls her seat in close.

And then even closer.

She looks in the mirror, and she likes what she sees.

Then her hand snakes forward and gives a little twist to the right ...

And the engine roars to life.

Oh my stars. My little girl is behind the wheel of a car.

Yep.

The Roo-girl finally had her first official driving lesson, which then, according to our state law, finally validates her learner's permit and allows her to get behind the wheel of a large deadly weapon with her mother in the death seat.

Please hold me.

Actually, she is doing well. A little nervous yet and not paying as much attention to detail to suit me, but we're all still in one piece.

And she is pleased with me as well.

I am actually a very calm driving instructor, even though I must tell you that there is nothing in this world -- and I seriously mean NOTHING in this world -- more frightening than sitting in the death seat of a car with your child behind the wheel.

But she views me as very straightforward, issuing instructions in measured tones and never raising my voice.

Calm on the outside.

Inside, however, my stomach lining is rapidly being eaten away.

I should get an Academy Award.

Crossposted at From the Planet of Janet

my children are driving (me crazy)

So I successfully taught two daughters to drive.

Now I have two daughters who firmly believe "have car, will travel."

I'm sort of used to it with Jen.  shes had her license for two years now,  she got her car right after she passed the road test.  That first summer, she relished her new-found freedom, driving all over our community. She drove to work, she drove to the store, she drove to hang out with her friends.  Oh, my, did she hang out with her friends!  I spent many evenings waiting to hear the car pull up on the driveway, unable to sleep until I heard the car door slam.  We had many long discussions about what time was reasonable for a young lady to come home at night, especially on a weeknight when mom has to go to work in the morning.

Becca  got her license a few months ago, and got a car just a few weeks ago...and already she's starting to drive all over creation. She drives to school (she's a cool senior, you know), to work, and to hang out with friends.  Haven't had an issue yet about staying out late, but that's primarily because she has to be at school at 7:15 in the morning. I just can't wait to see what happens this summer!

I think my daughters appreciate why I worry.   Becca had a minor fender-bender one afternoon  a few weeks ago -- more scary than anything else.  Just some minor damage to the front fender, but she was shaken up enough that she called my mom to come down to the accident scene.   And then she got that flat tire on a Saturday night...and AAA left her out there for so long, her friend's dad finally came out and changed the tire himself...

And Jen had  an accident one night while driving home in the rain, she rear-ended an SUV, hard enough for her airbag to deploy.  She's fine, but the car...not so good.  I just "loved" getting that phone call, and having to pick her up after the car was towed.

But may I say "thank G-d for the airbag, there wasn't a scratch on her"?  Last month, her friend Joe was in an accident that put him in the hospital for almost a week....he's still dealing with the repercussions....

Can you see my hair turning grayer?