School Shopping Reclaimed Pussy Hairspray Sister

Friday the kids and I went to Joplin for the big, much-advertised NO SALES TAX WEEKEND. Was that fun? Laws, no. M-O-O-N spells "NO SALES TAX WEEKEND brings out the crazies, the crankies and the horrible drivers." We hit Rangeline, the big main street in Joplin, and for miles I could see nothing but cars and cars and cars. And I just had this gut feeling that virtually everyone in those cars was in a bad mood. Turns out, I was right. That was a weekday - I can't imagine what shopping was like yesterday. Laws.

I had bought Abby some shoes a few weeks ago and apparently her feet have grown this summer. We exchanged them for a whopping size 4 1/2 girls. Next stop: Women's shoes. This seems like a big deal and early to me, but in truth, she has the smallest feet in her class. Last year, most of those 4th grade girls were wearing women's sizes 6 and up. Eegad, what large feet you have, women of tomorrow! Not sure about the boys and frankly, I don't want to go there.

Sam got some generic Payless brand Airwalk look-alike high-top Cons. You know, those things we wore back in the late 80's, early 90's. I had a yellow pair that was almost the color of calf scours, Tater had pink I think. Anyway, Abby bought a pair of low-top look-alikes in the boy section early in the summer, so now her brother decided he needed a pair. She told him that he absolutely COULD NOT get the same shoes as she had, even though they are boy shoes. His are black with dragons on the sides. Abby picked out a pair of girl shoes on NO SALES TAX WEEKEND, though. She tends to lean toward the butchier side in clothing and shoes these days, not that there's anything wrong with that, but I was silently pleased that she picked out some utterly adorable Mary Janes. Kady makes up for any lack of femininity in Abby, what with her wearing polka-dotted high-heels with everything these days, but still I like it when Abby looks like a girl occasionally.

The girls got new backpacks at Penney's because they were all half off. Kady's is Disney Princess and Abby's is camouflage. Of course.

We went to Lane Bryant when our mall shopping was finished. I got some new jeans because at work we get to wear jeans on Fridays and eventually I will start working on Fridays and I want to be ready when that time comes. And thanks to the fact that Lane Bryant is continually working to raise the self-esteem of fat women everywhere, they have changed their sizing on jeans. I now, for the first time in my life, wear a size 6. Of course, that is only in jeans from Lane Bryant, but I take victory where I can and my victory lies in my size 6 LB jeans right now. And boy howdy, they are comfortable. I just might concede that they are most comfortable than any jeans I have ever owned. I think it's because the tag says "6."

Yesterday Abby and I finally started tackling her bedroom. I cleaned Kady and Sam's back weeks before the garage sale, but Abby's is a task not to be approached lightly or without proper rest the night before. And something for my nerves. That child is a packrat, a slob, a hoarder and in some ways, a goblin because of the way she cannot let go of anything. I'm not talking toys, dolls or books, I'm talking gum wrappers, rubberbands and lids, lots of lids. Why lids? Ya got me. I'm stumped. Why the child feels she must save little scraps of paper and lids off of water bottles, I will never ever understand. I am probably stifling her creativity and she'll probably end up in therapy because of it, but I am bound and determined to break her of this awful obsession. She's a goblin, I say.

It's interesting, her room right now. She is literally caught between little girl and big girl. While she loves her lip gloss and clothes and posters of Hannah Montana and Zack Efron, she also is still quite in love with her Cabbage Patch Dolls and Littlest Pet Shop. I will gladly put up with the two sides of her because I'm not ready to see the little girl go just yet. She's constantly struggling with it, but fortunately the little girl is still winning a battle or two here and there.

We're finishing her room today, along with rearranging it and putting up her canopy, which can double as mosquito netting. If you live anywhere near here, you totally know what I'm talking about. That flood bred some scary-ass mutant mosquitoes, I'm tellin' ya.

The big plan yesterday was that a group of us girls were going to go to dinner and then to see Hairspray. The original group was five (would've been six had Cousin Courtney not been AWOL. (Btw, call me, Cousin!)) but then it was down to four. Then three. Then one. Obviously we scrapped the plans. Then Tater and I decided we'd go ahead and take advantage of Paul's good humor and offer to watch the kids. When we told him we weren't going, he said he'd work on the boat (you know, the one that meows), but then decided it was too hot and said we might as well go because he was staying in the house anyway and he might as well hang out with the kids. Sometimes he just does stuff like that and I remember why I love him so dang much.

So we got around and headed out, me in my new size 6 (heehee) jeans and adorable orange chunk-heel sandals that only match one shirt so I wear that shirt a lot to justify the buying of the shoes, and Tater in her "I'm lookin' for a man" shirt. (That's what her ex calls it. If my ex called one of my shirts that, I'd be sure to wear it around him as much as possible, just to make a point. But that's me.) We giggled and girl-talked all the way to Joplin. While I was originally disappointed that the GNO didn't work out, I ultimately am so glad it worked out the way it did. I have missed my Tater. I made her a mix CD for her birthday with nothing but 80's and 90's songs that had some meaning for us - clogging songs, NKOTB songs, Duran Duran, Debbie Gibson and Guns n' Roses to name a few - so we listened to it and just talked.

We ate dinner at Garfield's and had planned on shopping until the movie started, but neither of us really had enough money to shop AND go to the movie so we went to two movies. (Probably cost us more than shopping would have, to be honest) The first one we saw was the The Simpsons Movie and while I'm a fan of the Simpsons, I hated this movie. Hated it. It was dumb and stupid and I didn't like it.. Tater was just upset that so many kids were in the theater, because it was definitely not a kid-friendly movie. The series isn't kid-friendly, so why would the movie be kid-friendly?

After feeling like we lost IQ points for having sat through an hour and a half of cartoon stupidity, we went to Hairspray and let me say that if there had been a spot level enough and cleared out enough for me to have danced, I'd have danced through the entire thing. At the risk of being struck by lightning for saying this, it's better than Grease. I didn't think such a thought would ever be in my head, but yeah, it's better. And what I think impressed me the most is that when Tracey Turnblad wore a sleeveless dress (not once but TWICE) in the movie, they did not make an attempt to cover up her flabby arms. I found that refreshing. She is a large-size girl, she is beautiful and she is talented and she wore a sleeveless dress on the big screen. Yay! It was real. I like real. And I love John Travolta in drag.

Today the kids are taking turns driving Sam's remote control Dodge Ram through the house and over my toes repeatedly. I am catching up on laundry and then Abby and I are tackling her goblin lair. Paul is working on the boat that still meows.

Oh by the way, my feline surrogacy is over. No, Flicka isn't in the great big litterbox in the sky. Nope, she's part of why the boat is still meowing. Friday night I was nearly beside myself because she wasn't eating, she hadn't pooped and I wasn't keen on doing what the internet said I needed to do to make that happen and I was so afraid we were going to lose her and oh wow, the guilt I'd have felt for that one. So I took her outside and held that momma cat down until Flicka finally found her way to a kitty titty and after a few low growls at me and the kitten, Mamacita started licking that kitten and relaxed and commenced to purring. I stood out there, swatting mosquitoes and getting a little misty over the whole scene. When Flicka was done eating, Mamacita stood up, picked her up by the neck and took her out to the boat. Paul was sitting at the picnic table watching the whole scene. He stood up and said, "Kristin! I don't WANT her to take it back to the boat!" I put my hands on my hips and said, "Look, I have bottle fed that kitten for two days. If she is taking her back to the boat, let her. She'll wean 'em in three weeks and you can sell the boat then. Now hush. You're ruining the moment." Let me just take this opportunity to publicy thank Aunt Janet and Cousin Stacey for their offers of help and advice during the kitten fiasco. Family rocks.