Just in case you read this article, and decided to sanitize your sponge in the microwave? Yeah, about that. Just make sure it doesn’t CATCH FIRE, OK? OK. Thanks.

Brought to you by The Nothing Quite Seems To Go the Way That It Should Housewives Network.

Is it wrong of me to be rubbing my hands in glee at the thought of being able to watch the State of the Union tonight? I love picking apart Bush’s speeches. I really, really do.

At preschool drop off today, C went running into his classroom full of news. “I’m getting a new baby sister!” he exclaimed. Before I could open my mouth, the teachers offered up congratulations, the moms ohhhed and ahhhed over how I didn’t LOOK 20 weeks. Finally I was able to stutter out an “Um, no. My SISTER in the Really Big State with Cowboy Hats had a baby girl last night. Not me. Done. Very, very done.”

But, by the time I made it across the street to the gym, the news had spread far and wide. I am going to be spending days explaining that really, my tummy is just in need of some sit ups. Sigh.

Welcome to the world Baby C2, even if I am very glad that you are not mine. Your mommy is much better at this parenting thing than I am, trust me. You are much, much better off.

As part of the school registration process for next year I have to select whether my kids will be attending morning or afternoon sessions (yes, we have a half-day kindergarten program). My ideal? Both kids in the morning. Morning school makes sense. We get up, we get dressed, we have breakfast, we make beds and off we go. We come back, it is lunch time and half the day is nicely accounted for. Unfortunately, the drop-off and pick-up times for kindergarten and the preschool in which C is currently enrolled are within five minutes of each other, and there is no busing available. Meaning that either I need to switch preschools, I need to place them both in the afternoons when the pick up times are staggered a bit better, or one child needs to go in the morning and one in the afternoon.

Switching preschools would make the most sense, except for the fact that this preschool is everything I always wanted in a preschool. The children play with sand and water. There is lots of art. They sing appropriate seasonal songs (played on RECORD PLAYERS people), paint rocks, and make a turkey centerpiece for Thanksgiving. There is no formal curriculum. There is no expectation that children will know how to read by the end of the pre-K program. The highlight of the year? A parent-organized Spring Carnival that involves games like blowing ducks across a wading pool using straws and playing hopscotch. Really.

I just. can’t. leave this school. I just can’t. So the next logical solution? Put both kids in the afternoon. I would get three afternoons a week to do whatever. Go to the gym. Take a nap. Gasp, read a book. But….C is not a great morning person. Oh, he is up bright and early, but trying to get him out of pajamas and into the car? Painful. Very, very painful. And I fear that our combined laziness would mean that if we had no place to go until 12:30, that we would be racing around at 12:25 trying to get dressed. Which is fine for next year, but would make the 8:25 am start in 1st grade a living hell. In fact, I am somewhat fearful that we might never recover from a year of afternoon school.

My final option is putting C in morning kindergarten, and A in afternoon preschool. Which, while fine and lovely for them, leaves not a second in any day that belongs to me. AND puts me in the car four freaking times a day. Because C will not be attending our neighborhood school that is two blocks away. No, he will most likely be attending kindergarten on the other side of town because of a nightmare of a redistricting situation.

So what do I do folks? What do I do?

Well, since I’m not going to be living it up in New York this weekend, I might as well cook.

Saturday – Maple Mustard Pork Tenderloin with Roasted Apples, side of green beans.

Sunday – Clay Pot Chicken and Vegetables Pot Roast

Monday – Twice Baked Sweet Potatoes with Tofu and Kale

Tuesday – Leftovers

Wednesday – Chichimama’s Ultimate Chili

Thursday – Leftovers

Friday – Barley, Black Bean and Corn Burritos

I had big plans this weekend. BIG PLANS I tell you. M was taking the kids to see his sister and I was headed into the city to spend the night with friends, check out a new wine bar, eat some yummy food, and wake up in the morning for a lovely brunch. I was going to be kid-free for a full 36 hours or so, and it was going to be fabulous. But, like all good plans, this one too came to a screeching halt at 5:30 am this morning when C woke up coughing, that oh so distinctive “barking seal” cough. Croup is not. my. friend.

On the up side, he is old enough that he just sounds like hell, but in reality he could still breathe fairly well. And that is a good thing because our hot water heater is so old that I couldn’t actually generate any steam in our bathroom.

Sigh. And do you know who I actually feel worse for? C, and not because he is sick. He was so looking forward to going to see his cousin. When I broke the news that he wasn’t able to go, he looked like his heart was going to break. Poor thing.

Yesterday was visitation day at C’s preschool. All the mommies (no daddies this year) came and sat behind their child for an hour and got to “see first hand” what a day in the classroom was like. Never mind the fact that 99% of the kids were attached to their parents’ sides like flies to glue traps (except of course C, who insisted that he sits on the letter K and as the letter K was against the wall there wasn’t room for me so I should just stand by the door).

The class is working on the letter “i” and each child was asked to come up with a word that began with “i.” “I” is for ice cream was a popular answer, as was “i is for iron. Apparently there are mommies in the US who iron too, Rebecca. One girl, whose parent was not in attendance, jumped up and down and screamed “i is for iPod!” The teacher applauded her, and then asked if her mom or dad had an iPod. “Oh, yes, but mine is PINK!” she replied. “Theirs is just boring white.” A four year old. With her own iPod. I sure hope they got accident protection insurance with that.

We woke up this morning to what could be called a dusting of snow, if one wanted to be generous. Just enough that a snow brush, if I had one in the car, might be useful. But I don’t, and I have no idea where it lives, and M is out of town so the kids and I will just sweep our mittens across the windows and call it a day.

A’s face is currently pressed up against the windows and she is gazing out at the snow in the backyard, very insistent that there is enough there to make a snow man. I have tried to dissuade her from that idea, but I have a feeling that the instant C is up and coherent we will be pulling on snow pants and boots. She probably doesn’t remember the snow very well from last year, although she might. You never quite know with A. But right now, it seems magical and wonderful to her.

I’m generally very pro-snow. I love to look out at the yard, the trees and bushes have such a regal yet gentle look when laden with white fluff. But this year I find myself hoping that it doesn’t snow, as if it does we have a real snow removal issue as we will have to shovel out two houses.

At the old house, we had three walkways, a circular drive and a long shared drive back to the detached garage that all had to be shoveled, by hand, because it was gravel. Here there is only one short walkway and a much shorter drive to deal with when it snows. As an added bonus, there are teenage boys on either side of us and across the street, so there is some hope that one of them might be dispatched to our place to shovel if we ever get more than a dusting, especially if M is out of town, which he always is when it snows. So once the other house is someone else’s problem, it can snow all it wants.

At the old house I could sit on the sun porch sipping my coffee and imagine that we were alone with the snow. The new yard is not quite as peaceful looking as the old one, however, as we can see the houses behind us clearly and the deck ruins the view in some respects. I am also fairly confident that our new neighborhood is going to be gregarious on snow days, which, while fun for the kids, means that I will spend snow days traipsing around instead of enjoying the enforced solitude.