The vexation that is finding a good haircut, cherry jam

This morning, I had a haircut appointment with a new stylist. In my opinion, finding a good hairstylist is as hard, perhaps more so, as discovering a great bra or feeling you look terrific in your bathing suit. I am ever-hopeful of meeting the next Eddie, my genius, preposterously affable hair-cutter in Boston; twice since we moved, I've scheduled appointments with Eddie during visits back. That's how seriously thankful I am for a good do. In D.C., I've hobbled grudgingly from one maybe-we-can-date kinda stylist to the next. There was the tall, thin, Latin Flamenco-type in Virginia; the Scottish gal in Georgetown who I liked quite a bit but who always ran at least an hour behind, and really I just don't have that amount of free time and if I did I wouldn't want to spend it in a salon foyer suffering from a slight air of pretension; most recently I've entrusted my locks to the skilled but surly Vietnamese woman in Bethesda. She is one of those negative black holes that you just want to tear yourself away from lest you get Dementored by her gloom. But on the flip side, she could cut my hair, though I always hated it on the first day which is kind of de rigueur with many trims.

Whatever is a girl to do?!

Today I ventured to M Studio in Bethesda for an appointment with Michael. One of my dear friends, L, who always looks gorgeous, sees him, and really, the promise of any sort of copy of her hair was enough for me. People, it was a delight, and I left feeling updated and chic. Also, I laughed a lot, bought some products, was then inspired to come home and throw out all of my decades-old products that I never did know how to use, and I look forward to a return. Sayonara, surly lady. Welcome to my life, M!

This is epic. I won't have to count the years until my next visit to Eddie.

After my return, I flitted about my kitchen, stroking my smooth hair and working on the sour cherry jam. I did add the black pepper and a bit of super-aged Balsamic, and this is a complete gem of a jam. I will post the recipe for you soon! This would be killer on some goat cheese or Brie, a bagel smeared with cream cheese, atop a cheesecake (catch the underlying theme here?).... Mamma mia!

Then a walk with Percy because I needed some bacon to make the black beans the kids have been wanting and Wagshal's sells this great Amish bacon that cannot be beat. On said walk, I leaned over to scoop poop and my enormous, jute, "summer bag" slipped off my shoulder and onto a rogue bit of poop. Disgusting but it did not deflate me!

We got back home to start the beans, then to pick-up to get the boys, a random "field trip" to Target, success at Target, home to make the rice. I watched Jack swoon over his rice and beans and died a little bit when he said, "Mom, you are a better cook than a professional one." I had a glass of rosé, am trying to be zen about the ocean of markers and "confetti" (cut up paper for no reason at all) all over my floor, and am about to embark on bath- and bed-time. Whew!

Hosting a Star Wars party for a 7-year-old

Star Wars is definitely enjoying a comeback right now; the entire franchise is all the rage with young boys, at least if my sons and my oldest's entire 1st grade are any indicator. So when Jack said he wanted a Star Wars birthday party, I knew it wouldn't be difficult, as it was for his police party two years ago, to find age-appropriate supplies. If you want to review what we did for that party, click here. I started with the invites which I usually make myself by having Tom photo-shop one of the boys' heads on a figure that represents the theme of the party (last year, Jack's head on Batman's body, for example). I posted this earlier, but here is this year's invite: Death Star, Luke, the Episode and Intro bit (which Jack wrote; hilarious)...

Per the usual we planned to host the party at home (Jack loves it, and frankly we prefer it) so I told J the group had to be small, and then I started to look for a primary Star Wars activity in which no one would be bored or get injured. Answer: a light saber battle in the backyard. But, plastic light sabers are hard, and there was no way I was going to put Oliver and a gang of seven-year-olds outside with long, hard plastic sticks. I recalled seeing somewhere online that a like-minded Mom had used swim noodles to make a safe saber so I picked some up while we were in NC a few weeks back (one of those items that's cheaper and easier to find NOT in DC; each was $1.99 or something at the Wilmington Harris Teeter). I ordered some Scotch aluminum foil tape (about $3.25) from amazon as well as a roll of black duck tape (more like $6), cut the noodles in half, and T and I pulled up a picture of all the main Star Wars characters light saber hilts on line and rolled out individualized ones in about twenty minutes. These were enormously popular today!

If your child then insists he have a double-sided saber, as does Darth Maul, Duck Tape two of the noodles back together.

As for decorations, I rarely buy them anymore because we have fun making them. This year, Jack did them all, and I think they're great. Good way to get him involved in the party planning process!

I've never been huge on giving out a ginormous favor bag at the end of a party, but a few cool items related to the party theme can be fun! (Those Wonder Woman mini-piñatas from Oliver's party still crack me up!) So in addition to each kid keeping his light saber, I bought a selection of DK Readers, each about some different element of Star Wars, and, because Jack's actual birthday is July 4th and boys seem to love things that explode, some Pop-Its.

And then the cake- I always have such a blast designing the grand finale. I bought the toppers via amazon and was happy with them though only Darth Vader's saber lit up when both were supposed to. Boo (especially for $10). But Jack loves them, so c'est la vie. These light saber cupcake picks (also amazon, $6) were a huge hit and made a fantastic, spirited addition to Darth, Luke and the glitter sugar. I decided on a tiered cake to suggest a fight on a mighty precipice and used 9", 8" and 6" pans (two layers of strawberry, one of chocolate). I already had the red sprinkle sugar and green sanding sugar but was psyched to find these cool, black sugar chips (like irregular confetti; $3.50) at Sur La Table last week (where I headed to find the 6" pan). It was perfect! I loved how Jack set up his SW action figures around the cake as well as this light saber he made from clay yesterday.

Lastly, I decided to treat the boys, because they LOVE to dress up, to a Jedi costume each. I got these from the Rubies storefront on amazon. You can see Jack's above in the double-saber pic. Here is Ol's which is slightly different. They're not terribly well-made, and the fabric is extremely chintzy but the boys are wild for them, and both held up really well today, battles and all!

All in all, a great party!

Epiphany

The boys have now been to camp for two full weeks, meaning that the three of us have been getting used to our new schedule for an equal amount of time. They love camp, but shifting from the school year to summertime is still an adjustment. Oliver is learning to manage longer days away, gaining stamina that will help his full school days at a new school in the fall not seem quite so dramatic. Jack, a little guy who has always thrived, and continues to do so, on structure and routine, is sorting out the kinks that come when the teachers and kids you've seen every day for nine months are no longer part of quotidien life.

Meanwhile, I've had time to think about the dynamics between each boy and myself as well as that among the three of us together. I noticed, back on that first Monday of camp, the day I felt wildly carbonated with the promise of a new degree of free time, how "on" I was when I picked them up.

I was terribly excited to see them, but my on'ness was more than that. It was almost as if I'd donned a cloak of uber-mom: she's here; she's psyched; she is now yours. And I was exhausted by the time we arrived home. We live all of 7 minutes away.

The boys are kinetic, hyper-verbal jumping beans; there's no denying that. But how was I complicit in the sense of us all being amped up and ready.to.go! ? This is not a maternal guilt issue: they've been gone all day so now I owe them X or Y to make up for that. No, I realized that by setting the bar of interaction at a towering level for all these years, in part in order to meet their energy/precociousness/whatever, I've instilled in them a sense of expectation for just how much Mom can be, will give and should of both. Hmm. This realization came with such clarity and struck me with the force of a battering ram.

And so, in addition to our summer goals of Jack being able to complete an entire bath capably, thoroughly and on his own, and both kids mastering the "do NOT wake Mom and Dad up before 6:25a" rule, I added a rejiggering of the dynamic between them (the kids) and me. Just because they go to camp each day (as they now will school for the next 20 years), does not mean that I have to cease being Emily (vs Mom) when they're home. I am totally committed to being present and engaged and on the floor and at the playground, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, but it is OK for me to also insist that they play by themselves or not ask me to look at every line of every drawing before moving on to the next line. I should be able to write a letter, cook dinner or any other activity as my main event, rather than attempting to address the envelope or quickly chop a carrot in moments stolen during their bathroom breaks or other unforseen reprieve.

They need to let me do this, but I must teach them how, because what we've been doing obviously hasn't been terribly effective in this regard.

I am not the sort of parent who will ever helicopter. That behavior seems only to lead to bad outcomes for everyone involved: weird, enmeshed parent-child relationships; kids who don't think or know that they can do things on their own, or who lack the confidence or interest to try; children who grow into adults who aren't able to be alone happily. I once had a roommate tell me that she hated to be alone because whatever would she do? To myself I was intoning: read, file your nails, see a movie, organize something, go somewhere, cook, eat, nap, write....the list was endless, and to this day, I've felt that my parents teaching my sister and me the wonderfulness of time spent alone was an enormous gift. Of course there can be lonely or dull moments in those times, but I'm talking bigger picture here.

So no helicopter but I'm definitely extremely engaged, and so each day to slowly shift the dynamic sands, I've tried not to be too over the top in my effusive pick-ups. I've tried to come home, hear all about the goods and ughs of the day, and then ask them to do their chores and/or go play. We still draw, play chess, all that jazz, but it's not constant and it comes after the stuff that are their responsibilities, not mine. Jack gave me bloody hell because I told him that the state of his room was untenable and he couldn't play until it was much(!) cleaner. He went on and on about unfairness and time, and I simply said, "Jack, I've told you this before and I really mean it. I am NOT your servant, nor do I want to be. Your mess is not my clean-up job. If you think it takes a long time, think about how long it would take me, on top of all the other things that are my jobs. Get up there and don't come down until it's nice."

Baby steps, for that room took a while with several viewings and "nope, not yets" by me, but it did get done, by him.

We never stop growing, should never stop learning, ought to seek new means if others aren't working. This week sucked in many ways, but I feel confident that the outcome of our family dynamic restructure will be good for us all. Here's to the ever-hopefulness of parenthood! And to my train coasting into Penn Station momentarily.