Merry & Bright? Oh, yeah right.

Yesterday began like any other day. Thumbalina woke up at 4, then again at 5, and one more time for good measure at 6. She then fell asleep into a slumber so serene I spent a few moments pondering the same question I find myself asking every morning around this time. What the heck is in my breast milk at 6am that isn't in there at 4? For crying out loud, why can't she fall into this deep a sleep while it's still dark outside and the thought of coffee hasn't even entered my mind? Then I spent exactly one second thinking that perhaps I too, would go back to sleep - which is when I was hit with an epiphany. If I were to fall asleep, that's when she would decided to wake up. That sneaky little turkey. So naturally, as long as I get the day started she will remain asleep. That is messed up, little one. Well played.

So there I was, hyped up on coffee at the crack of dawn, making bad decisions that sound like good ones at the time. You know the kind - the overly ambitious ones that used to be made at 2am over strong cocktails. I thought, hey! It's the day before Christmas Eve, so what better time than now to become Super Mom and get all of my errands done before half of the city has had its coffee. I was shaking and sweating with the anticipation of all that would be accomplished. Now all I have to do is vacuum the floors, fold the laundry, empty the dishwasher, take out the garbage and wait for the little bug to wake up. Nothing to it.

Of course she decided to become a lady of leisure that morning and slept in. 

With my coffee buzz quickly wearing off, I finally managed to strap her into her car seat and run my designated errands. When I finished, I felt quite accomplished and decided that this would be the time to text my husband and brag about how awesome I am and how doesn't he think that since I am so amazing my talents would be better served staying home and never going back to my day job again. Alas, this text was never to be sent because what did Super Mom do? Somehow lost her cell phone in a caffeine induced frenzy. Thumbalina and I spent the next hour retracing our steps trying to find my lifeline to the rest of the world. 

I said 5,000 desperate prayers to St. Anthony and, I'm sorry to say, by the last prayer I used some prime choice curse words to express my feelings to the lovely patron saint of lost things. I am pretty sure I actually did this out loud in the Target shopping center, so I looked like an angry religious zealot with a side of coffee crazed mom and a dash of verge of meltdown baby. And then, when all hope was lost, the heavens opened and the choir of angels began singing because there, underneath the SUV of another frazzled mother lay my cell phone. 

So I apologized profusely to St. Anthony and feeling a burst of newly renewed energy, I rushed home to make eggnog cupcakes just in time for the holidays! 

Okay. Those eggnog cupcakes just about killed me. First of all, in my day, baking used to be synonymous with day drinking. I looked longingly at the margarita mix and then cast a sidelong glance at the little one. With a gigantic sigh and just a little too much responsibility, I resentfully resigned myself to carrot juice instead. I rushed around the kitchen measuring a thousand cups of powdered sugar and whipping my egg whites into glossy peaks. Hold on - just what the heck is a glossy peak? I hope they meant frothy mess because that is exactly what it was. Thumbalina hung out in her Bumbo seat watching my every move and yelling at me periodically. She even chucked her Sophie the Giraffe at me, much to the pooch's chagrin. The pooch loves that toy and I know it broke her heart to see such a delicious chew toy being flung about in such a careless manner. Despite being caked with frosting and trying to alternate mixing flour and eggnog into a batter, the little one took no pity on this baking challenged woman and demanded to be fed. And so, because I fancy myself Super Mom, I turned myself into Stretch Armstrong and reached my boob across the kitchen to feed that squawking child of mine. The whole time I was hoping that the mailman would not pick that moment to deliver one of my many online shopping packages to our doorstep, for oh what a Christmas sight he would behold - although it would serve him right, the cheeky trickster. He never delivers the mail at the same time everyday and I spend all day anxiously awaiting the mail. It is, sadly, the highlight of my day - but I digress.

I finally got those cupcakes baked and now it was time for the frosting. Turns out I am no good at frosting those delicious little pastries, but what they lack in aesthetics they make up for in taste. They are delicious and it only took me an entire day to bake them!

I'm sure that at this point you are sick of reading my ramblings and are thinking "c'mon, get to the point! Give us that eggnog cupcake recipe!" So here it is. May your Christmas Eve be filled with love, joy, and just enough booze to take the edge off!

This is what they are supposed to look like:

Photo courtesy of Taste of Home magazine

And, this is what mine looked like. Definitely won't be winning any Cupcake Wars any time soon!

She's back. With Things to Say.

Well. For a girl who likes to talk as much as I do, especially about myself, I have taken quite the hiatus. Of course, I do have an excuse, one of the "I was with child" variety. This excuse comes in handy for a person such as myself. You know the kind, the ne'er do well, I'll do it tomorrow, ah screw it type. But the fact of the matter remains, I was with child and that made me one hundred percent, no beating around the bush, ridiculously and utterly booooring. Cocktails anyone? Nope, I'm pregnant. Designated driver? Screw you, I'm pregnant. Want to come hang out, eat and watch tv? Since I'm pregnant I will do that in solitude in the privacy of my own home, thank you very much. And therefore, rather than bore you with the completely mundane stories of swollen boobs and an overwhelming desire for Honey Nut Cheerios, I took a break from the blog.

But I'm baaaack, with lots and lots of things to say. Mostly about myself, of course, but I have decided that I am now going treat this blog as an act of public service. You lucky ducks. I am going to tell you the things no one discusses publicly about early parenthood. Don't get me wrong, it's lovely - in a pull out your hair, why am I still fat, sweet Jesus this kid is going to kill me kind of way. I don't mean to offend anyone, but the truth isn't always pretty, my sweets.

Too often we are inundated with Facebook newsfeeds and Instagram shots of smiling babies and skinny mommies with perfect hair and makeup. Posing with their perfect husbands. In their super clean house with their Norman Rockwell painting puppy. I, of course, am totally guilty of that which I disdain. "Look at me!!" my pictures scream. "My baby is totes adorbs and my husband and I get tons of sleep and we are happy happy happy!"

No one has to know that less than 1 shutter click before, my super sweet baby was screaming like a banshee while I frantically struggled to free my five hundred pound boob from my super sexy nursing bra while my husband wrung his hands in complete helplessness asking "what can I do?" What can you do?! There's nothing you can do! This tiny human is going to take all of us down with her! Even the perfect pooch decided to seek refuge in the garage rather than succumb to the mania occurring in her living room. (Which, Coco likes to remind us, was peaceful, serene, and baby free 9 months ago. No judgment.)

Did I mention that this picture was the first time I even attempted hair and makeup in like a week? And it only took me about five hours to pull it all together!

Then, just like that, the screaming subsides, the pooch cautiously ventures out of the garage, and for one beautiful moment we find ourselves in the eye of the storm and click! We get that perfect picture, post it on Facebook, and laugh diabolically. Muahahaha! Those Greenes sure have a charmed life.

I hope you find this funny and relatable.
Don't get me wrong, I am blessed in ways that I couldn't have even imagined possible. But that won't stop me from dishing the dirt.

And talking about myself.

Aren't we so perfect?!
photo courtesy of Audrey Marie Photography

Cheers to 30 Years

Today, I no longer stare down the barrel of 30 - I have been shot square in the face with a brand new decade. I saw it coming, but nothing prepared me for voluntarily waking up at 6:30am the day I entered old agedom - I suppose now I will rise with the sun, eat dinner at 4pm, and buy a set of knitting needles. I'm going to need an afghan. These old bones get cold. Luckily for me, I have always enjoyed a good 3pm happy hour, so that won't be affected. However, I may have to old lady up my choice of drink. A gimlet is starting to sound delicious.

Now since I'm up at the crack of dawn when I should be sleeping in to prevent the forming of any more wrinkles, I am taking a moment to reflect on the decade that has just booted me out of the nest. Those roaring 20s sure were some formative years, so let me take some time to share with you the life lessons I learned the hard way.

Lesson #1 - Hippie Haute Couture and the Difficulty of Free Love

I arrived in Santa Cruz with tie dyed dreams searching for a drum circle to call my own. I was convinced that a dorm room poster of Phish and a Bob Marley quote hanging on my door would ensure me the friendship of our dreadlocked counter culture. But breaking into the inner world of hippie hoopla is harder than you think, regardless of your bootlegged casette tape of the Grateful Dead and your love of all things Dylan. No longer would wearing a Save the Manatees tshirt suffice. I had to look the part. So I dragged my clean hair and freshly showered behind down to the local hippie clothing store, where I proceeded to spend much of my student loan money (which I am still paying back, even at the ripe old age of 30) on shockingly expensive patchwork pants. I raced back to campus, knowing that these patchwork pants were going to score me a slew of hippie besties. No such luck.Turns out that just because you enjoy a good Cherry Garcia, you will never be one of them.

Especially, incidentally, when your parents make you sign a contract that you won't dreadlock your hair. The odds were stacked against me from the start. I was doomed to a destiny of friendship with squares.

Lesson #2 - Carlo Rossi is a Party Stopper

Walking into a party with a jug of Carlo Rossi is awesome. Just hook one finger into the handle, throw it over your shoulder, and drink it like you just don't care. And believe me, you won't - you're young, you can handle a cheap wine hangover. And though your fellow party goers may not tell you at the time, you will be forever remembered as legend - wait for it - dary.

Lesson #3 - Don't Date the Locals

Just don't. Find yourself a nice boy (or girl) from a nice town from somewhere far away.

Lesson #4 - Major in Something Useful

I majored in Sociology. I can take one look at my surroundings and determine that I know all there is to glean from a social setting. I may even quote Alexis de Tocqueville and act all super smart with my pseudo intellectual comments. But I still don't understand statistics and sociology never got me a job. There is a real world out there, folks. Don't forget that as hard as you try to hover on the outskirts, eventually you will be forced into it. And when you do, it's nice to be able to be employed.

But don't get me wrong. Working for the man sucks.

Lesson #5 - If You Marry A Man Who Steals Steamrollers, You Asked For It

There is never a dull moment with Mr. Greene. But what did I expect, when one of my first dates with said husband was a cozy, intimate little setting at his arraignment. One fateful night, Mr. Greene thought it would be a great idea to hotwire a steamroller and drive it to the beach. Sounds fun, right? And it was all fun and games, as it always is, until someone gets caught.

Now 7th Avenue in Santa Cruz is no back country road. In his defense, Mr. Greene is from a small town in which hotwiring a steamroller may be heralded as local heroism. For years, the town would remember such an antic. It would be handed down from generation to generation, shared over pitchers of beer at the one and only town bar. Shared as a parable at church sermons. Perhaps even a statue of said steamroller stealer is erected. However, in Santa Cruz it is seen as a serious crime, for which you will go to jail.

And hence a love story was born. And here I am, many moons later, with a ring on my finger. I asked for it.

Lesson #6 - Don't Trust the Chocolate at a Phish Show

Just don't. Unless you're into that kind of thing. Then do.

Lesson #7 - Don't Judge a Book by its Cover

I once was riding on a super packed bus to downtown Santa Cruz, on my way to my mediocre job at a juice shop which shall remain nameless. I suddenly got very dizzy, and passed out. When I came to, I was staring into the dirty face of a funny looking man with a Peter Pan hat. His hat had a hole cut into the top, and coming out of the hole was one gigantic dreadlock. Of course I immediately decided that dizzy or not, this man was not my knight in shining armour and I should get out of this situation stat. However, this crazy one dreadlocked Peter Pan man helped me off the bus and bought me an Odwalla. Then, in a cloud of fairy dust, he disappeared back to Neverland.

Lesson learned.

Lesson #8 - Leave Town

Mr. Greene and I had finally had enough of our little college town, and hightailed it out of there to the happening community of Woodland. And though we ultimately did not stay there forever, I made the best friends in the world and had some very funny experiences. It's where I attended my first Demolition Derby. It's where Mr. Greene proposed. And it's where I, along with my closest friends, almost died on Cache Creek. Your 20s are supposed to be full of adventure. Never stay in one place for too long. You have the rest of your life to settle down.

Lesson #9 - Blame it on the Alcohol

Enough said.

        Sub-Lesson #9 - Don't Drink Tequila in Mexico

        Again, enough said.

Lesson #10 - One Day, You'll Look Back and Laugh

True story. I have burnt many a bridge and done many a stupid thing throughout the past decade. I was a much different person at 29 than I was at 21, and I get dizzy looking back and thinking about all the crazy antics that I somehow escaped from. While many things still make me cringe, I am able to laugh about it now - although some of my laughter is just a nervous, how could I, hope no one remembers that kind of laugh.

My great-grandma used to say, "This too shall pass". I just didn't know it was going to go by so quickly. So cheers to 30 years! Now someone fetch me my walking stick. You should treat your elders with respect.

Rose Colored Glasses and Other Such Nonsense

I often live as though life is just one big sinkhole. You know, one day you can be hanging out with the 2.5 kids and the family dog in your picket fence encased front yard, marveling at the beautiful weather and maybe even enjoying a cocktail or two on your front porch. You're probably inhaling the smell of sweet jasmine, thinking, "Self, I've sure made it. This is the American dream. Nothin' can bring me down!" The next day, boom! You walk out your front door onto your wrap around porch meticulously decorated with Adirondack chairs and maybe even a porch swing, then promptly fall right into a giant sinkhole that manifested itself overnight. You didn't even have time to drink your morning coffee and read the paper before you're neck deep in a sticky situation.

I treat life as though the glass is perpetually half empty. If there is a silver lining, all I see is the storm cloud. If there is a rainbow, I focus on the rain that preceded it. And if the Dodgers are winning a game, I sit back, cross my arms, and wait for them to give the game away.

So of course, given my depths of despair attitude and penchant for all things negative, I tend to ignore the signs that life is giving me lemonade rather than lemons. I am Chicken Little, running around screaming that the sky is falling. I'm the Old Lady Who Lived in a Shoe - a story that, incidentally, has made me terrified of little children. I am the Boy Who Cried Wolf. You get the picture. Everything is over exaggerated, hyperbolized until I have become convinced that I am going to fall headfirst into the rabbit hole and spend the rest of my life trying to figure out why, exactly, a raven is like a writing desk.

Because I was obviously not issued my rose colored glasses, I ignore all large, hand painted arrow signs that I am in fact heading in the right direction. I married a country boy raised by Giants fans, who willingly decided to forsake the pride of San Francisco and fully commit himself to the boys in blue just to have a harmonious marriage - because, you know, marriages break up over baseball disagreements all the time. And when he agreed to move to Southern California to follow my dreams, did I thank my lucky stars and think about what a fortunate gal I am? Why no! I instead grumbled to myself that it would never work out, we would never hop on the 5 and head south in a uHaul without looking back.

When we opened our first joint savings account, the online banking system randomly gave us an icon so that we would know it was our account. Can you believe it was a picture of seagulls? But did I think, hey, what a lucky sign! Nope. Instead I thought man, seagulls sure are ugly birds. And when we opened our joint checking account and were given a picture of San Diego as the icon, I figured we would never live there in a million years.

One day, my job miraculously asked me to move to San Diego permanently. Not too long after, my husband got a fantastic job in San Diego as well. Instead of marveling at this serendipitous situation, I focused on how much I hated that he would be traveling a lot and never home. And when our landlord decided to sell the house we were living in right out from under us, I definitely did not view it as a fantastic opportunity to find our dream home.

But find our dream home we did, complete with a fancy below ground pool, honey! We were handed the keys to a home of our very own just this afternoon. Not without signing our souls away to the bank, of course, and over extending ourselves to the point where we might become the weird recluses on the block who never leave their front yard...

But never mind that. Today I am going to revel in the positive because come on, we all know that there is no way a raven is like a writing desk. The sky never fell on Chicken Little, and I can only trust that the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe pulled herself up by her worn out boot strap, told those little whipper snappers to stop whining, and went on to move into a beautiful Louboutin and live happily ever after.

You're Killing Me, Smalls!

The 4th of July is my favorite holiday. It never turns out quite like I think it's going to, but nevertheless it is tied up with Easter as the all time best holiday of the year. (Please see It's Not a Party Until Somebody Cries) Whenever I picture what type of celebration I am going to have, I picture the Sandlot. Maybe a pick up baseball game on a dirt diamond, fireworks exploding as we play the all American pastime. A block party where all of the neighbors get together and barbeque hot dogs and hamburgers, everyone decked out in their red, white and blue finest. Dads looking like Ken dolls drinking scotch and beer, moms popping mother's little helpers as they scramble to make a potato salad that can feed hundreds of demanding children, who, incidentally, are using their outside voices. Okay...this isn't sounding as awesome as it was at first. But you get what I mean.

By the way, didn't you all have a crush on Benny? I know that at my age I risk sounding like a bit of a cougar, but Benny was so cute! I believe he is single handedly responsible for my love of Converse sneakers. And then he grew up to be a Los Angeles Dodger, as if he couldn't be any more crush worthy! Though once he made it to the big leagues, he was not very good looking. At all. It was nothing short of tragic.

Anyway, I always set out with the best of intentions to create a holiday that brings back a sort of all American nostalgia, a tapestry of all things patriotic. Think s'mores and pool parties, barbeques and the Beach Boys, tossing the baseball around and the smell of hamburgers wafting through the air. Instead I usually drink way too much beer, and find myself watching my husband do dangerous things with fireworks while we all belt out a very off key rendition of Proud To Be An American. Hey. What can you do. Nothing ever ends up quite the way you plan, but it's still my favorite holiday.

So this 4th of July, remember that it doesn't matter which side of the aisle you are on (although come on, let's face it...there is only one right side!). Whether you celebrate by drinking beer, lighting fireworks, going on vacation, or eating veggie burgers, don't forget to take a moment to revel in your freedom and thank the powers that be for all the opportunities provided as a result of that freedom.

Unless you live in California, where you either have to have a permit, pay a hefty fine, pay a lofty tax, and prohibit all things profitable. But hey, the marijuana is legal!

Have a safe and happy 4th, ya'll!

"Let me tell you something, kid. Everybody gets one chance to do something great. Most people never take the chance, either because they're too scared, or they don't recognize it when it spits on their shoes." ---The Babe, Sandlot

Photo Courtesy of blog.moviefone.com