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How to Survive Science Fair

How to survive science fair? Answer: Tap into available resources. (Read: Siblings make great subjects.)Science Fair Cookie

Also,  find a way to incorporate cookies. 

Sunday afternoon, Bigs tells me she wants to submit a science project for the science fair which is happening… Monday morning. If this sort of last minute epiphany happens to your kid, you know— options are limited. It might be too late to go to the store. You definitely don’t have time to do anything that gets moldy or hatches or turns into a crystal palace. And for crying out loud, it’s Sunday! who really wants to be working on a science project when it’s a beautiful day outside? Continue Reading…

Random, Recipes

Accidental Vagina

My daughter had a great idea: she wanted to start a book club! She decided the first book would be Junie B. Jones, 1st Grader: Aloha-ha-ha, perfect book to read the summer before heading into 1st grade.Accidental Vagina_1

I printed a list of discussion questions, planned on rainbow kebabs and Hawaiian-themed crafts, and at the center of the shindig… there would be a cake. A glorious volcano cake. How difficult could that be? I’d simply use the Wonder Mold we already owned— you know, the one you use to make the dress and stick the doll torso in the top? Only we’d stick sparklers in the top, frost it with chocolate, get some molten lava flowing down its sides and boom, done. Continue Reading…

Family, Random

Meeting Mabel

You now how when you’re a kid and you say to your best friend, “One day our kids will be best friends” and then you grow up and they are? But somewhere in the middle you began to wonder if you were ever going to make it to babies or marriage or even adulthood at all? So you forgot that you said that until it actually happened and when it did it was like the world stopped and everything came into complete focus and you realize that life is perfect and so you cry, you just bawl like a little tiny baby?Meeting Mabel_1

That’s what it was like for me when my kids met Baby Mabel. Continue Reading…

Random

BlogHer14 Photo of the Year

I’m passionate about many things— home design, DIY, crafts, parenting… but I’ve always judged myself against the “experts” in these fields: people with design degrees, perfect Pinterest pictures, published books. “It’s been done before” is a thought that often holds me back from doing. Recently, the frequency of my posts had slowed down, overwhelmed by all the “been done befores” and “been done betters” out there.Blogher14 PoTY_1

I felt rudderless. So I bought a ticket for BlogHer, a giant blogger conference where thousands of (mostly) female bloggers get together to learn how to improve their blogs, make connections, and seek inspiration. I was hoping for a road sign. Something to help me sift though the noise and guide me in the right direction. If I didn’t find it, maybe a few drinks with friends IRL would help. Continue Reading…

Random

The Sex (Toy) Scandal

You know that feeling when you get home from a long trip? No more hotels, no more suitcases, no more security lines. With the journey behind you, you can finally relax in the comfort of home sweet home. You shower off the virus-filled recycled air and coach-class pretzel smell and put on your softest cotton pajamas. The ones you thought you had brought on your trip, but forgot. As you crawl into your cozy bed— the one that is like no other, because it is imprinted with the unique shape of you and your loved one— you spot something new, something you’ve never seen before, sitting on the vanity. It is small and white, cube-shaped… and as you move closer… its identity becomes clear. It is a die. But instead of the usual dots, it is covered in red hearts and instructions on how to pleasure someone. It is a sex toy. But it is not YOUR sex toy.The Sex Toy Scandal

Do you know that feeling?

It’s a strange combination of shock, confusion, violation, and holy-crap-I-can’t-wait-to-write-about-this. Continue Reading…

Random, Travel, Women

L’enterrement de vie de jeune fille… and me.

I was dancing on a bar with my sister and her friends when I leaned down to speak to a St. Maarten local. “How do you say ‘bachelorette party’ in French?” I yelled. The DJ was blasting dance beats and the bartenders were doing body shots with customers. Waves crashed in the darkness behind us. The tall, Caribbean man turned to me, the whites of his eyes ominous in the moonlight.“L’enterrement de vie de jeune fille,” he said. I shuddered.Caribbean Man

Funeral of the Life of the Young Maiden.

I immediately sobered up. We’d been drinking Bahama Mamas from penis straws, dancing on tables and somewhere in this bar, one of us was wearing a giant inflatable johnson and inviting fellow bar mates to play a ring toss game. Continue Reading…

Random

“Get More Sleep” and Other Resolutions

Really? After Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, Pearl’s birthday and all those relatives you really want me to reflect on 2013 and set goals for 2014? Hell no. I’m exhausted.Harem Girl

However… if we’re just talking about resolutions as I know them— a list of items I really, really want to accomplish but never actually do, then I guess I can throw something together.

1. Get more sleep.

2. Take the kids to Knott’s Berry Farm.

3. Knit my husband a sweater.

4. Take a trip alone. Somewhere exotic. Brunei? Dubai? Somewhere with an “i”…

5. Become a harem girl in a sheik’s golden palace.

6. Wear genie outfits and indulge in caviar and champagne.

7. Ingratiate myself to the 800 international concubines. Share recipes.

8. Rub the lamps. Smell the soaps. Smoke the hookah.

9. After a week of laying low, go for it. Get crafty with some golden thread. Make pom pons.

10. Hammer a brass teapot into a statement necklace.

11. Make a fierce winter coat from a Persian rug.

12. Pin to Pinterest. Watch it all go viral.

13. Become the sheik’s favorite American.

14. When he says my reward is that I get to have oral sex with him for 30 days, quickly offer to plan his next party instead. Tell him: “I’m much better at setting a table.”

15. Hire Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon for entertainment.

16. The night of the party, slip a mickey into the sheik’s cosmo. Have the eunuchs carry him back to his chamber.

17. Attend private after-party with Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon. NO OTHER HAREM GIRLS INVITED.

18. At breakfast, thank the sheik for his hospitality but say, “Now it’s time for me to go…”

19. Cue Justin and Jimmy to sing Ramble On.

20. Push the fig platter aside, stand on the banquet table and yell, “NOW!” signaling the revolt.

21. Watch all 800 harem girls toss their head wreaths into the air and spill out of the palace.

22. Lead the pack. Hair, silk and rubies flowing in our wake. A thousand wild camels galloping behind us.

23. Get a really good selfie.

24. Remember the eunuchs! Be brave. Go back and rescue them.

25. Sleep on the dunes.

26. Bid farewell to my new friends. Sign autographs. Make golf date for hubs and JT.

27. Hop a flight to LA. Call the family. Tell them I’m coming back with a great goulash recipe and a basket of rose soaps.

28. Stop at the giant donut place on the way home and eat three chocolate-chocolates.

29. Start Facebook petition for national holiday in my honor.

30. Get more sleep.

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