Category: Family (Page 27 of 27)

The Cool Aunt Makes Cookies with the Kids

December 22, 2008 / Katie L. Carroll

One of the blessings I have been able to count on this holiday season is that my nine-year-old nephew still thinks hanging out with his old aunt is fun. We have movie nights, we cook together, we talk books. It’s all good, but I know it won’t last. He’ll be a teenager soon (too soon!), and teenagers don’t think their aunts—even not-so-old ones—are cool.

We recently got together at my sister’s house to make Christmas cookies. Surprisingly, my three-year-old niece and two-year-old nephew abandoned their Christmas video to come help us.

My little nephew got a bit anxious as we were cooking and decorating the cookies. A gingerbread woman and a gingerbread man were the only raw cookies left on the table. While I helped my niece with the sprinkles and my sister helped my older nephew with the frosting, my little nephew helped himself to the gingerbread lady.

He boldly proclaimed, “I’m gonna lick the lady!”

Now, my little nephew speaks very clearly, and my sister and I both heard him and understood him. At any given time in my sister’s house, one of the kids is bound to be making some noise. Usually it’s quiet singing or talking to no one in particular, but this time my little nephew was actually making an announcement. My sister and I made the mistake of not taking his announcement seriously. So, sure enough, he licked the gingerbread lady.

Then he said, “I’m gonna lick the man!”

Before my sister or I could stop him, he leaned over the table and licked the gingerbread man. Well, there’s no sense in wasting licked cookies, so we cooked them up and wrote his name on them with edible gel.

Here’s a few of our creations:

Seeing An Upside-Down Frown Face in the Sky

December 13, 2008 / Katie L. Carroll

Lately the evening sky has been offering up many spectacular views. On December 1st, the world was treated with the sight of the crescent moon, Venus, and Jupiter in close conjunction. My pictures didn’t really come out, so I will refer you to this link (clearly this Brian Combs is way better at taking night pictures than I am!). His pictures show about what it looked like from my neck of the woods, but here’s a great gallery of what people all over the world saw.

As you may remember from my Rainbow Connection post, I enjoy watching the sky for natural phenomena. Not everyone cares about this, but my circle of friends/relatives also seem to enjoy these wonders. I know because my mom called me to tell me about the celestial conjunction (my dad had told her about it) to make sure I didn’t miss it. I did have to kind of coax my husband off the coach to head to the beach with me, but he was a good sport about it and he did thank me for showing him the unique sight.

A few days later, I hung out with my nine-year-old nephew. I asked him if he had seen the conjunction. He said he had seen it and that it looked like an “upside-down frown face” (again check out Brian Combs’s photos to see what he means). I laughed because that was exactly what I had said. My husband was like, “You mean a happy face.” And I was like, “No, I mean an upside-down frown face.”

I was actually quite pleased to learn my nine-year-old nephew and I are on the same wavelength when it comes to looking at the world. After all, much of my writing is geared towards kids exactly his age. (And, in my defense, he is quite bright!) He also showed his perceptiveness and dry wit when he asked me to guess what “grandma” (my mom—don’t be mad, mom, I write this with great affection) said about the conjunction. He told me, “She said, ‘I’ll be dead the next time that happens!'” That’s such a thing that my mom would say—probably half serious, but with a bit of humor as well—that my nephew and I just cracked up about it.

And last night, I was treated to an awesome sight while driving down I-95. Amidst a scene of black asphalt and cold steel, I sensed a light peaking out of the clouds. Only the light was on the opposite side of the setting sun. As I stared at the clouds, a humongous full moon emerged from. It was so low in the sky, I swear if I had kept going straight, I would’ve driven right onto it.

I called my husband to tell him to check it out. He was also on the road and saw it too. He was (pretended to be?) as impressed as I was…he really is a good sport! When I got home, I grabbed my camera and headed to the beach. The moon wasn’t quite as low and huge anymore, but I still got some decent pictures of it emerging from the clouds. It was very cool, despite the fact that a full moon on a Friday night is something we should all be wary of.

The Alter Ego of My Glasses-Wearing Self

November 9, 2008 / Katie L. Carroll

Sometimes I think I have a secret identity. Really it’s more like an alter ego…or maybe it’s just a split-personality disorder (just kidding…such disorders are nothing to joke about). It all started the summer I turned 18—it’s all downhill after 18! I was watching the Bridgeport Bluefish (What? You’ve never heard of them…I bet you know who the New York Yankees are) play baseball, and I noticed I was having trouble reading the scoreboard.

Seeing as I was about to start college—and I was contributing a lot of my own money to pay for my higher education—I figured I’d better make the dreaded trip to the eye doctor (I really do dread all trips to the doctor, except the dentist, for some reason I like visiting the dentist). As I suspected, I needed glasses. Great, now I had a giant visual on my face, my previously secret nerdiness exposed.

As I got used to being a person with glasses (I know, you’re thinking four-eyes), I realized the potential of it. This potential was fully realized when I became a part-time contacts wearer. With my glasses, I feel smart, like a real intellectual, like the writer me. Glasses me is an avid reader who enjoys sweet white wines and listens to NPR in the morning. With my contacts, I feel strong, like a warrior, like the soccer player me. Contacts me is an avid sports fan who yells expletives at the television and runs marathons in Alaska. (Without glasses or contacts, I’m just visually impaired me!)

Though, maybe I should’ve realized long ago that I had a secret identity. When my siblings and I were younger, my parents would often separate us into two group. My mom would say, “The three older ones go with Dad, and the three younger ones come with me.” The problem was there was only five of us and, yes, you guessed it, I was child number three, smack dab in the middle. That’s the problem with being in the middle; you never quite know where you fit in. So I made do with both roles: I tattled on my older siblings and bossed around my younger ones.

This identity crisis only got worse when I got married. I decided to legally change my last name to my husband’s and to keep my maiden name for writing and other pursuits (like soccer) in which everyone already knew me by my maiden name. Not only has this caused confusion for me, but it also seems to have stymied the Connecticut Registrar of Voters.

Last week, I went to my old high school gymnasium to vote. I found my street name (which of course was split into two tables, so I had to think about whether or not my house number was higher or lower than 40) and gave the lady on the left my license. The lady on the right slid her ruler up the line of names until she reached mine…only she appeared to be confused. I glanced at the list. There was my husband’s name, my name, and my name again.

“Wait,” the lady on the right said. “Which one are you?” (How many ladies does it take to check-in a voter?) I wanted to say, “Didn’t you listen to the other lady, who just read the correct name off my license?” Instead, I simply explained that one was my married name and one was my maiden name and somehow both ended up on the list. Apparently the government has trouble with the multitude of women who change their names upon marrying.

I should refer to all my life stories as “The Adventures of —” (I’ll fill in the blank when I figure out who I really am). Sometimes I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror when I’m not wearing my glasses and think Oh! That’s the face I know. Not that stranger with the glasses. Then again, I tend to wear my glasses more frequently than my contacts. Which is my real identity and which is my alter ego? Maybe it’s better if I don’t know.

Just Another Game at the Old Yankee Stadium

July 28, 2008 / Katie L. Carroll

Last week I went to Yankee Stadium to watch the Bronx Bombers play the Minnesota Twins. There wasn’t anything particularly significant about this game. It wasn’t against a noteworthy rival, nor was it at a pivotal point in the season. It was simply a midsummer’s game on a Tuesday evening.

There are a few essentials for a game at Yankee Stadium: a hot dog and beer (which will only cost you $14.50, your left arm, and your first-born son), the reliable voice of Bob Shepperd (whose career as announcer has lasted more than two of my lifetimes), and the boisterous bleacher creatures (who are incredibly organized when it comes to chanting out the names of the Yankees’ starters—I would be very scared if this group ever decided to use their ability to rally folks for something useful) to name a few.

Then there’s always that fan who is so annoying that by the end of the game you want to ring his neck—or your own—just to put you out of your misery. When we first sat down, my brother and I found our prime candidate: a young boy, maybe about seven or eight (I know, how mean to pick on a little kid). But this kid was seriously annoying. He asked more questions than I thought humanly possible. In fact, I think every sentence out of his mouth was a question. Now I’m all for encouraging kids to explore and think and ask questions, but this was ridiculous.

“Who are the Yankees playing?” The Twins. “What are those things on the field?” Portable cages. “Why are they there?” To protect the players in the field during batting practice. “What’s the score?” The game hasn’t started yet, so it’s 0-0. “What time is it?” 6:54. “Who’s Babe Ruth?” He was a baseball player. “Is he playing today?” No, he’s dead. “Who’s that on the screen?” Derek Jeter. “Is Derek Jeter dead?” No, he’s the shortstop. “What’s a shortstop?”

The questions went on and on and on. I mean had this kid ever even seen a baseball game on TV? After about ten minutes of this, my brother and I were about ready to jump off the upper deck. Anything to make it stop!

Thankfully, we realized we were sitting in the wrong seats and quickly moved one section to the right. In our new seats, the only obnoxious fan we had to deal with was some annoying guy from California who was obsessed with Goose Gossage. For all his enthusiasm, he wasn’t very smart, and he was a bit drunk. He informed us that it took a lot of guts to name your kid Goose (even though Goose Gossage’s real first name is Richard and Goose is just a nickname…but really, this was guy a huge Yankee fan!).

Like I said, the game was nothing particularly special. But maybe it meant a little more to a few of the fans. It was the first time my three-year-old niece had ever been to Yankee Stadium. And it may have been the last time some of us will ever set foot in this Yankee Stadium because pretty soon the House That Ruth Built will be torn down.

I guess the new Yankee Stadium will be state-of-the-art with all kinds of food stalls and really clean bathrooms and all, but what about all the history and memories? Yankee Stadium is where my dad, my brother, and I sat in the bleachers and watched Aaron Boone hit a walk-off homerun in the bottom of the eleventh inning in game seven of the 2003 ALCS. This game gave me a glimpse of my dad as a kid, the way he chose just the right moments to flip his hat to the rally position, only to quickly flip it back when it wasn’t needed so as not to abuse the privilege.

I can’t help but be a little sad that Yankee Stadium is going to be destroyed…out with the old, in with the new. The mystique of an 85-year-old baseball icon reduced to a pile of debris.