Picnic Stix

I love wine. I love picnics. I love bringing a bottle of wine on a picnic.

I ran across something that I would put in the top 20 of best inventions ever. (I'll really have to think about those twenty, but at this point in my life, this is a great idea!)

They're called Picnic Stix. There are three little "stix" which you stake into the ground. One holds the wine bottle, the other two hold the wine glasses.

Like so:

The stix cost as much as a bottle of wine (obviously, we don't drink the really good stuff).

Click here if you would like to make your whole picnic experience just a little better!

Setting boundaries

In her series of posts about parenting and the adult child, Moxie listed several bullet points which I have broken down into separate posts. Please see this post and this post to understand what the heck I'm talking about.

• If I take steps to setting some boundaries, do I have a way to check myself so I don't get guilted or manipulated into abandoning those boundaries just to keep peace or win approval?

Boundaries used to be a BIG issue with me. For a long time, I would revert to the five year old self whenever I was around my dad. I felt stupid and clueless, clumsy and not at all like the bright, young, intelligent being I was. At some point, I experienced some enlightenment and decided that I NEEDED some boundaries so that I would not feel like an idiot whenever I saw him, or talked on the phone. What I use most to check myself on these boundaries is my own conscience. If it doesn't feel right, it ain't working. I am very true to myself and know without a doubt when I am being guilted and manipulated.

• Am I prepared for short-term anger and hostility when I start to draw some boundaries?

It makes me ill to negotiate my own boundaries to keep peace or win approval. I had a girlfriend in high school who ended up dating somebody that I wasn't fond of. At. All. It was really tough for me because I was very good friends with the girl, but her boyfriend frightened me. I tried to redefine our friendship to the exclusion of this man (yeah, who is manipulative now?). Finally, I laid it out there that, as much as I loved her, I wasn't willing to sacrificed my own being to continue our friendship.

Oh, yeah. THAT went over like poop in a punchbowl. She said fine, if that was how I felt, then we did not need to be friends anymore. And, as much as it hurt at the time, I got over it eventually. I never felt like I lost my integrity, and to me, that was worth more than our friendship. Because if you can't be true to yourself, how can you be true to anyone else?

• Is there anyone else who knows my parent who can help me troubleshoot and back me up in my plan?

This was tough for me growing up because the only one I felt like I could talk to, who knew my dad, was my mom. Bless her heart, too, because that's a tough position to be in. Oprah once said "When you dishonor the parent, you shame the child." My mom never talked badly about my dad. She never said what a jerk he was for being, well, such a jerk! But she did console me when I needed it, and explained to the best of her ability why I felt so let down. And she always told me how proud she was of me, for choosing to be firm on my boundaries. Once I decided I was done being the victim of my past relationship with my dad, my mom was my biggest cheerleader.

Recently my mom was talking to me about me not being raised by both her and my dad. She was asking me if I felt any kind of loss by not having two parents in the same house. I told her I didn't know any different, so no, not really. She asked if I had any anger associated with her decision to leave my dad when I was young. Again, I never knew a household with my dad and my mom, so how could I compare? But she wanted to really talk about it, dig deep, and I just didn't want to go there right then. And I told her as much: "I don't want to talk about that right now." It was to the point and succinct. My mom was a little stunned, but said "Oh-kay." And that was the end of that discussion. (That's setting boundaries!)

The more I thought about it, later, I realized something big that would have been different had my parents stayed married. My relationship with my dad would have been much different. I would probably have much more trust in that relationship than I ever will now. He probably wouldn't have treated me as he did if my mom was around to bear witness, to intercede. If they were both active parents, instead of passive judges on the others' parenting, it would have changed my life tremendously. I could play the "what-if" game forever, but my life and their marriage just didn't happen like that.

And I'm okay with that.

WOW what a giveaway!

Shannon has masterfully blessed us with a super amazing giveaway regarding one of my favorite topics: MUSIC.

I absolutely love the Wow Hits CDs, I have them related to everything from Christian music to the 80's. They are awesome! Check out this link to witness for your own self!

http://www.wowonline.com/

The giveaway will bless the winner with a boxed set of each of the CDs featured on the brand new compilation WOW Hits 1 CD.

So hopefully the random generator will look kindly on me!

Bierocks

This weekend we had some ground beef hanging out in the fridge. Every time I'd open the fridge door, it would sit there, looking at me, wishing I'd hurry up and make it edible. I would sidle over to the pantry, and the onions would give me their puppy dog eyes. I couldn't stand it any more.

I browned the ground beef (2 pounds) with a chopped onion and drained any fat. Half of the mixture went into a crockpot mix for another post. The other half was made into Bierocks.

Some may spell them with two "r's", some may call them Runzas, some may even call them Samosas (I like mimosas with my samosas but I get giddy over alliteration). This is my recipe and if the name of the dish has no teaser as to what's in it, it may very well get eaten!

So, you take the browned hamburger/onion mixture and you add half a head of chopped cabbage. You can totally cheat on this and use bagged cole slaw if the mere thought of chopping cabbage exhausts you and you can't find your husband to bribe to do it for you.

Cook until cabbage is soft and then you let the whole mixture cool. This is important because you will be handling it and if it's too hot, it will just frustrate you and that's all too common so don't let your food be the frustrating force in your life.

Put the cooled mix in a bowl and add shredded cheese. Your choice of cheese, I put in cheddar because it's what we had. Salt and pepper it a little and mix it up.

Take a can of refrigerated crescent rolls, or a can of biscuits, or a can of pizza dough, and pop it open. You're going to put a few spoonfuls of the beefy cheesy mixture into the biscuit round or crescent roll triangle, or if you're using the pizza dough, you can cut the dough into rectangles. Then fold it over so it's a little hot pocket and put them on your cookie sheet. Bake per the instructions on the can so the meat heats up and the dough cooks golden brown.



Yummy, good stuff. You got your meat, veggie and cheese in a hand held little pastry. Enjoy this and lots of other good eats at Randi's Recipe Box Swap!

Great Expectations

Part 1 of this post series is here.

The first four bullet points Moxie posted are the most basic, yet often, the most difficult to embrace.

• What can I reasonably get from my parent?

I will change the word "get" to "expect" in the first point. When I was dealing with all my dad issues as a kid, I expected him to act like a father. I expected him to be loving and attentive, be responsible and kind, and be proud of who his daughter was. I fully expected him to be, if not like the dads I saw on TV, then at least coherent enough to interact with me.

It was not what I "got" though. What I got was a dad who was much more interested in alcohol or drugs than the few weekend visits with me he was awarded by the court. I got a dad who would willingly drop me off at a girlfriend's, or an ex-girlfriend's, so he could go get high and not have to watch parent me.

• Is that enough?

If I got what I expected, it would have been enough. It would have been more than enough, compared to what I got. For years, I wanted that kind of relationship with my dad. It never happened, and I doubt it will.

• If not, is there someplace else I can get that so I'm able to let go of the need to get it from my parent?

I will also interject the word "someone" else here, someone I can go to get what I want so I can let go of the need to get it from him. Absolutely. Lots of places and people. Unfortunately, the revolving door of relationships I subjected myself to over the years wasn't always the healthiest of choices. I tried out all kinds of people to see if I could experience the relationship I expected of my dad. None of them measured to my expectations.

• What am I willing to give up to get something from my parent?

For a long time, I ran headstrong straight into that brick wall. I would cry and hurt and try all over again, just to have him look at me, or talk to me, or listen to me. I had the imprint of that wall on my forehead for years. Finally, I realized something. Well, several somethings.

1. First, he was never going to be the man I want him to be.
2. Second, there was no way we could go back to the times when it was the worst and he could change his behavior.
3. Third, me getting all worked up over everything that happened in the past and present feelings didn't effect him at all. Just me. They say resentment is like taking poison and expecting the other person to die. That was exactly what I was doing.

So I stopped. I just stopped. I realized that I had my whole life ahead of me. I grieved for the little girl I was. I felt bad for her that she never had a daddy that she could love and crawl into his lap and just be. I just tuned it all out.

So, the answer to the bullet point is nothing. Not any more. I am me, and that's enough.

Parenting and the Adult Child

Over at Moxie's site, she has done an amazing job of dissecting and discussing parenting and the adult child. Here are some bullet points I lifted from her site and would like to elaborate:

• What can I reasonably get from my parent?

• Is that enough?

• If not, is there someplace else I can get that so I'm able to let go of the need to get it from my parent?

• What am I willing to give up to get something from my parent?

• If I take steps to setting some boundaries, do I have a way to check myself so I don't get guilted or manipulated into abandoning those boundaries just to keep peace or win approval?

• Am I prepared for short-term anger and hostility when I start to draw some boundaries?

• Is there anyone else who knows my parent who can help me troubleshoot and back me up in my plan?

These are excellent nuggets for thought. I have dealt with a lot of issues as a child and then an adult child and would like to use these points to expand on my own experience.

Full disclosure: Moxie's post was about the adult child as a parent, and I am not a parent. Her posts, however, inextricably link the adult child with her own parent, and that is the basis for my rambling.

Future posts will look at these bullet points in more detail as they have related to my own experience.

Speakerphones make me smile

The attorneys in the offices usually have their doors open, which can lend to some awfully funny eavesdropping occurrences. Not that I ever eavesdrop, but sometimes they are just so darn loud it's tough to tune them out.

Here is a snippet of a voicemail that my boss, we'll call him Jim Jones, left for his wife, Jen.

VM: Hello, you've reached the office of Jen Jones. Please leave a message.

Jim: Jen, hi, it's Jim... Jones. (chuckle) Uh, guess you knew that. (chuckle) Anyway...

Now THAT cracked me up! I thought about it the rest of the day and giggled. It probably took place two years ago and it still cracks me up!

For more things to make you smile, please check out Jane at What About Mom?