lizagull

After visiting Mark and Megan and Mirabelle and Meter, Kris and I journeyed up to Mike and Kate's house. Kate's company Christmas party was last night, and the two of them were looking for someone to sit the girls. My thoughts about sitting Liza and Maeryn usually run along the lines of "What? Play with the girls? Yes? When? Can I come over now?"

So, Kris dropped me off and left, as Liza, Maeryn and I played with a snap-together circuit set that I had bought Liza for Christmas either last year or the year before. To say that I purchase Christmas gifts a few years too old for young people is an understatement, because I nearly ALWAYS do it. Sure, a digital microscope is perfect for a four year old! What four year old wouldn't love to look at slides of insects on his computer?

Yeah. So, Liza didn't really understand electrical circuits. At least Mike was trying to teach her.

After a fabulous dinner of hot dogs and mac and cheese (mmmmmmmm, hot dogs for vegetarians, the best! I bribed Maeryn to eat my hot dog), we were allowed to watch an episode of Land Before Time (whoo!). Also known as "time for Kitt to work on her computer." I tell you, that's always fun time!

When bedtime rolled around, Maeryn was supposed to go to Mike and Kate's bed, with Liza heading to her own bed. The girls, however, had a better idea, and decided that jumping up and down on the air mattress made up for me was the best place for going to bed, not the two separate rooms. We played around for a while, with the two of them having problems going to bed until I rubbed their backs for a good twenty minutes.

They slept for a couple hours before I decided to go to bed. I really should have gone to bed when the two of them did. By the time I went to the bed, Liza was near the middle of the bed, with Maeryn bent over hogging the other half of the bed. I had no space on the bed. I nudged Maeryn a little bit, hoping not to wake her, and managed to wake her only a little in claiming my 10" of sleeping space.

Mike and Kate arrived home as I was drifting off. As near as I can tell, they wandered into the kids' bedroom, didn't find them, wandered into their own bedroom, and didn't find them there either. They're smart, though, and figured out we were having a slumber party in the pink room.

Par-TAY!

Mike stopped by tonight with the girls. He was in the area on errands, just had dinner with the girls and wanted to pick up seasons two and three of the Wire. Apparently, Mike hates me and Kris, because he loves the show. Too addicting. Chalk another victim up to Jason's DVD recommendation prowess: I originally purchased the first set after he recommended it in some post. Kris was hooked, as were Heidi and John and anyone else we lent the DVDs to.

Too bad I never really enjoyed the show. I watched enough, however, to know the characters and some of the references (especially the episode where like 20 minutes of dialog consists of one word, and that word begins with f). I might some day actually want to watch them. Until then, eh.

Kris and I were eating dinner when they showed up, but Liza was not to be stopped. She bounced around for a little bit, before asking me, in a quiet, unassuming, deceptively shy way, did I know where the marshmallow guns were?

Oh, boy, did I know where the marshmallow guns were!

I pulled them out, as Kris tucked the dogs into their crates. Liza and I spent a few minutes loading each of the two guns full of marshmallows before the firing frenzy began.

Liza and Mike/Maeryn shot the first round, with marshmallows flying everywhere. "Yeah, the dogs are going to love this," Kris commented. They'll be looking for those for a few days, to be sure.

After the first round was done, Liza picked up a bunch of the marshmallows to refill her launcher. Mike too that opportunity to fire marshmallows at me. He had to shoot a number of times before we were able to time the shot with the camera. Note Mike's evil red eye:

I did manage to capture a shot from Liza a few moments later, without trying:

Though, I later discovered I had caught a near hit very early in the first round:

When we were done, and the dogs has managed to clean up the "mess," Mike asked how six kids with marshmallow launchers would do over Christmas. I said we had four, and it was totally awesome. The best idea is to plant marshmallow ammo all around the field, so that you don't have to travel far to reload.

Here's hoping they capture some video of the event.

Kris and I dashed up to Mike and Kate's for breakfast this morning (where dash means "show up 40 minutes late"). Of course, I forgot my camera in the car when Kris and I went in. Kris hasn't been up to the house very much, so when he walked in, Liza was quite surprised. She looked up at him, put one hand on a hip, and announced, "I usually see just Kitt here."

Kris managed not to laugh.

Katie and Alex were up at the house, too. He and Maeryn played well together, though spending time with Liza means Maeryn behaves older than any other kid her age.

I managed to make pumpkin waffles again, this time with nutmeg instead of cinnamon, in deference to Mike. They were still tasty. I swear, that waffle iron (thanks Bharat and Jen!) is getting more use than any other appliance I own.

Except maybe the dish washer.

Maybe.

Kris and I went up to Mike and Kate's yesterday evening to make cookies with Liza. Kate invited a fairly big group of people (mostly all from work) to visit, I just hadn't realized how big of a group until we arrived there: everyone was tall. And I mean tall. Kate, Kris and I were the shortest adults there (exaggerating for effect, there were two other women shorter than I am at the party, but there were also five women taller, and all the men were definitely taller, it was like a giants' party, and we were there as midget entertainment).

Kris hadn't been to the Gulls' new house. After the drive up, I think he'll be even less likely to head up very often. Fortunately, they'll be coming down the mountain on a regular basis for work. We went up in Kris' car, and managed to drop his MPG down about five MPG on the way up. The drive took forty minutes, which may limit our visits, and definitely destroys any chance of our moving to the boonies before we're independently wealthy.

After a few minutes at the Gulls' house, it became very obvious that the trip up wasn't going to be a cookie baking event as I was expecting (i.e. similar to the Christmas cookie baking Mom and I would have with the Gudis twins). Liza was playing with a neighbor, who was maybe 13 years old (and, in the tall theme, nearly as tall as I), and much more interesting than a thirty-something ex-neighbor. The two of them dashed around the house, rolled cookies out, played in the loft, all the things two young girls do.

After an hour, I gave up and realized that, no, I wasn't going to have any cookie baking session with Liza, that their move to their fantastic new house essentially ended the ease and comfort of having good friends as neighbors.

I've been a bit upset recently at Mike for moving away. Less so in the last two weeks, but tonight just reminded me of it again. I know that the move is a great move for the family, more room, different lifestyle, and I'm happy for them. But in the way I know is selfish, I miss them a lot. Just as I still miss Ben and Lisa a lot. Life happens, people move, groups of friends change.

I guess I'm more frustrated that everyone around me seems to be moving on to the next phase of their lives and I'm stuck at a perpetual 29.