The Hunger Game
At 17 months old, my daughter Harper decided that the only food she would eat was graham crackers. They are good—I like mine with a little extra honey smeared on top. Obviously, I’m not the most nutritionally-aware mother, but I know that fruits, vegetables, and protein are all better for a growing toddler than honey and bleached white flour.
I got Harper strapped into her highchair. I was going to have to start using the shoulder straps soon. I’m not sure where she gets her gymnastics ability from—certainly not me or her father, who once gave himself a concussion by sneezing under a coffee table. I presented Harper with some banana, string cheese, and shredded chicken. Maybe my mistake was not arranging them in a cute smiley face or the shape of a puppy. Harper doesn’t have a Pinterest, so I assumed she wouldn’t know what she was missing.
“No,” she said, shaking her blonde curls as she pointed one preciously tiny finger at the top cabinet where I kept her favorite treat. I call the grahams “cookies” in the hopes she won’t learn the sugary truth until high school.
“After you have lunch.” See, I sounded like a good, health-conscious mommy. I waved a disk of banana under her nose.
“No.” Rinse and repeat.
After another couple rounds, I ate the banana myself to show her what she was missing, unstrapped her, and fed the chicken to the dog who never needs airplane noises to appreciate food. Surely Harper will just be extra ready for dinner. It’ll also be Matt’s turn to feed her.
Of course, Matt had to work late, so dinner was on me. I hoisted my princess into her throne. I put some sausage bites, apple chunks, and Cheerios (plain, not honey-nut) on her favorite Hello Kitty plate. I placed it in front of her with a big smile and jazz hands. Ta-da!
“No,” she whined, shaking her mousy, dishwater tangles as she pointed one chubby claw at the top cabinet where I kept those damn grahams.
“Eat your dinner first.”
This time she just started crying, perhaps because her blood sugar was roaming around the basement. Baby logic dictates that in case of hunger, refuse to eat. Solving the problem is not the point—the point is making your parent cry with you.
Half an hour later, Harper still hadn’t eaten a bite. I’d demonstrated the eating process so many times that I wouldn’t need to cook for myself. Once, Harper had picked up an apple chunk. I smiled and yum-yummed like a demented bobblehead. And cracked a tooth when she feed it to the dog.
Harper continued her hunger strike through the next morning. And afternoon. And evening. And the day after that. Harper got hungrier and crankier and whinier. I offered nearly everything else in our pantry and fridge to her. Not even her orange and banana smoothie tempted my little Genghis Khan. Matt tried feeding her once…and then ran to the store for Oxiclean. The pumpkin yogurt actually came out. Thank you, Billy Mays.
She wouldn’t even say no anymore—just pointed at the cabinet and made this uh-uh sound that reminded me of Grandpa’s runty piglet—the one the sow rolled over on and squished. I put in ear plugs, so I wouldn’t get ideas.
I caught Matt, the rat fink, reading a book in the driveway after he’d said he was working too late for dinner. When I my iron will started to rust, I duct-taped the cabinet shut. If I ever let him out of the doghouse, Matt could do without his Triskets until the siege lifted. By the end of breakfast on the 4th day, I vowed never to eat another Cheerio, and the dog was looking chubby.
For my own lunch, I ordered a sandwich from Jimmy Johns. Sure, I was perfectly capable of making a turkey sandwich myself, but if I went in the kitchen, Harper would follow me, then she’d see the cabinet, and then–nope. The kitchen floor was lava.
The sandwich came, and the dog was too full of chicken nuggets to be bothered to bark at Carlos, the delivery guy. (I may have been ordering Jimmy Johns for a couple of days.) I set my chocolate chip cookie aside for later; I’d need it for strength when Harper’s snack time came around. I guzzled my soda because I needed strength now.
“Uh-uh. Mmm.”
That sounded close, really close—like not-in-the-kitchen close. Harper was at the ottoman, one hand pointing at her mouth and the other at my sandwich.
She ended up eating half my sandwich—bread, turkey, provolone, and mayo. There was also mayo smeared on one of the dog’s ears when Harper’d stopped mid-sandwich for a puppy hug. Watching the dog try to lick her own ear was the highlight of my week.
Having only eaten half my lunch, I was still hungry. And a promise is a promise. If she ate lunch, she could have a graham. I peeled the duct tape off the cabinet and grimaced. I really should’ve looked harder for the surface-safe painter’s tape. One graham for me and one for my baby girl. I held the “cookie” down to her.
“No.”
Not Every Side is Equal
So the chair of the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) is seeking to actively undermine our children’s scientific education. Currently, this state’s science education standards requires “all sides of scientific evidence” to be taught. Thursday, Cargill called for another side of evolution to be taught despite there being no alternative theory supported by anything other than religious texts. I suppose that it’s to be expected that Rick Perry’s SBOE chair (who hasn’t been confirmed by the Texas Senate–just like his last 2 appointees weren’t) has a religious agenda.
Here’s to You, Rita Brown
I generally stay out of politics, but this letter, allegedly written by a Rita Brown, that popped up on my Facebook news feed got to me. I blame the logical fallacies. My comments are in bold.
Dear Friends and Family,
This letter is something I have never done before, mainly because I really prefer to be liked by my friends and family. So you admit that this is something that people aren’t going to like you for, but you’re going to do it anyway. I really like smiling and agreeing and making everyone happy. It is because I love you all so much that I have decided to share the information in this note about the dangers our country is facing. Please read it.
..in the spirit I am offering it.
I want to begin by saying that I fully recognize that our salvation is from Jesus and not any government or political party. No matter what happens in this country, our God is in control and He is our redeemer. I have a peace that reigns in my heart because of our hope in Him and Him alone. If you hope is in god alone, then why bother? However, I believe God deals with nations including ours.
Dale and I just returned from Washington, DC where we attended the “Values Voters Summit”, an annual event sponsored by a number of conservative organizations. It’s sponsors include the Family Research Council which seeks to outlaw “gay behavior” and to require the teaching of intelligent design in schools. There were over 2000 in attendance from all across this country. We heard from dozens of powerful speakers on a variety of subjects of interest to all of us at this critical time in our nation’s history.
We have attended dozens of similar conferences in DC, but this one had a different tone. There was such an overwhelmingly deep concern about the future of our beloved United States of America that we left with a sense of urgency I have never felt so keenly. We both felt the need to DO SOMETHING!!! This way-too-long letter is one response to that—a report for you of what we learned.
Most of us go about our daily lives going to the grocery store, football games, church, school, work—normal busy lives. We sorta hope that somehow the political scene and our government will get it all worked out so our lives can continue without interruption. Occasionally there are news items that catch our attention and we think, “I don’t like that,” but we put them to the back of our minds and go on about our business as usual. That describes my mindset most of the time.
However, I believe it is time to give major attention to what is going on in our country before it is too late. I truly believe we are in danger of losing the freedoms we have taken for granted and enjoyed for over 200 years. Rita must be addressing only white men since they’re the only people who’ve been free in this country for 200 years.
Let me summarize very briefly a few things we learned.
OUR CONSTITUTION AND RULE OF LAW
Our current administration is quietly and systematically going around the rule of law to put in place policies that severely limit the freedoms our founding fathers guaranteed in the bill of rights of our constitution
For example, through “executive orders” and other “mandates” we will now be forced to use our tax money to pay for abortions and other procedures that go against the conscience of many Americans. When the Catholic church objected, President Obama came up with a “compromise”: they were told they had a year to figure out how to change their beliefs to comply with the beliefs of the President. They must comply with the law not the President’s beliefs. This is not about the Catholic church; it is about the freedom of religion that our country was founded upon. Your belief in oppression doesn’t trump a person’s right to quality healthcare.
Last week Hobby Lobby, a company known for Christian values including closing on Sundays so their employees can go to church, was forced to bring a lawsuit against the federal government because Hobby Lobby refuses to provide the mandated insurance that would pay for abortions. They sued to not be required to cover morning after pills—not abortions. If they don’t comply with the mandates they will be fined millions of dollars each day until they are forced out of business. That is just one small example. We heard of so many others that have gone unnoticed and unchallenged by most Americans.
In 1996 Congress passed by large majorities in both houses the “Defense of Marriage Act”—DOMA. This law defines marriage as the legal union of one man and one woman and protects states from being forced to recognize same sex unions from other states. President Clinton signed the bill. Recently, President Obama mandated that this law be ignored and said that he would not enforce this law, effectively disregarding the role of our legislature and legal process. Section 3 of DOMA was found unconstitutional. Wouldn’t the role of our legislature be to support the Constitution?
These are only two examples of many, but you get the idea. Most go totally unnoticed by most of us. We were told privately by an insider, that if Obama wins the election he is not too concerned about who is in control of the legislature; he has lots of plans for using his “executive orders” to accomplish his agenda.
FOREIGN POLICY
This is one of the scariest things we learned. We heard from many “insiders”, including one member of Congress who serves on the Intelligence Committee, who briefed us on the“behind the scenes” things Obama has done to befriend our enemies and distance our friends. As I write this, Obama has refused a request to meet with the Prime Minister of Israel who is visiting here this week. Netanyahu openly supports Romney over the current President. It is Netanyahu who has been alienating the US in an attempt to goad us into a war on Iran. Instead, Obama is providing dozens of special visas for members of the “Muslim Brotherhood”—a terrorist group—to visit him here in the US this week. And after the religious riots, Obama canceled the visit.
We also learned that Obama has missed more than half of his daily intelligence briefings since he became President, something President Bush considered top priority every morning.
Meanwhile, we heard from a converted terrorist who began “missions” when he was 8 years old but became a believer when he was ministered to by Christians after a serious car accident. He and other Muslim experts told us of the massive infiltration of Muslim “bad guys” into schools, government, and businesses across the country. Scary. Because a born-again terrorist who has been brain-washed twice is a credible source.
Even though we send billions of our taxpayer dollars to countries around the world, we are disrespected and even hated more than ever by much of the world as evidenced by the scenes we are witnessing in the Middle East currently. You cry for religious freedom, hate Muslims, but agree with the extremists that the US is to blame for the action of 1 film maker? More and more we are considered weak and naive in the world arena which simply emboldens “the bad guys.”
MEDIA BIAS
If you are listening to mainstream media, you are getting a VERY distorted or even untruthful view of what is going on. I don’t know any other way to say it. Over and over we heard that the mainstream media for the most part has become part of Obama’s campaign team. Fox News of course shows no bias towards Romney. As one example, one day last week as an US ambassador and 3 other American’s were killed, our flag was burned and our embassies were under attack on the anniversary of 9/11, the mainstream media devoted 29 minutes and 25 seconds to criticizing Romney’s response (a bold statement of strength which I totally agreed with) and exactly 24 seconds to the response of the President of the United States’ (or rather lack of response.) The Obama administration’s response: “I condemn in the strongest terms the attack on our mission. We are heartbroken by this terrible loss. There is never any justification for violent acts of this kind.” Romney’s later response: “It’s disgraceful that the Obama Administration’s first response was not to condemn the attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks.” Romney must have failed elementary school listening comprehension.
One speaker said that the reason the liberals keep winning is that they, with the full cooperation of the media, have been so successful in demonizing conservatives. We as conservatives are portrayed as “right-wing, homophobic, women-hating, selfish, racist, intolerant, extremist, rich, war-loving, uncaring, religious nuts” to put it bluntly. This letter has been right-wing, homophobic, women-hating, racist, intolerant, extremist, war-loving, uncaring, and religious. Think about the last time you heard anything positive about Christians or conservatives from the media or Democrats. The conservatives I know are God-fearing, loving, generous, caring people who quietly go about doing good for those around them without expecting any praise or help from our government. That must be why your friends will dislike you for this letter. They have no intention of throwing Granny off the cliff or ignoring the needs of poor people.
ECONOMY
President Obama has increased our national debt from 10 trillion dollars when he took office to 16 trillion dollars today, a mind-boggling amount that our grandchildren will be burdened with. He would like to blame Bush and the Republicans, but seldom does anyone point out that Dems controlled both houses of Congress for the first two years and he was able to pass or cut anything he wanted. This amount does not even take into account the staggering cost of ObamaCare which will soon come into effect. An actuary report from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid services says that ObamaCare will save $200 billion dollars by 2016. Most say that our country is on the verge of bankruptcy. Our national credit rating was downgraded again this week.
With the deficit (spending more than we take in) at an all time high, the Democrats and Obama have not produced a budget in more than 3 years. The Republicans have sent budgets to the Senate but the Democratic leadership refuses to bring them up for a vote while blaming Republicans for blocking everything. Go figure. President Obama did send a budget to Congress a few months ago, but it was so extreme that it did not receive a single vote from either party. Meanwhile, this past week the Federal Reserve decided to just print billions of dollars as a stimulus for our economy. How would this approach to finances work in your household? You’re comparing apples to lamps.
On the campaign trail, Obama continues to make promises of “goodies” to be delivered to each group he speaks to in exchange for their vote–goodies that will have to be paid for out of our pockets and the pockets of our children and grandchildren. Isn’t that how an election campaign works—vote for me and I’ll give you what you want? There seems to be absolutely no recognition of our current economic situation or any thought of restraining government spending.
Unemployment continues at unprecedented high rates—over 8%–for 43 straight months in spite of Obama’s promise that he would cut the deficit in half and get unemployment under 8% as soon as he got in office. Instead he has created an unstable and hostile environment for business and job creation.
We cannot continue on this wreckless path of irresponsible spending and business stagnation without facing serious consequences. And there is no other USA to rescue us as we have rescued others.
ELECTION
For those of you who didn’t take time to watch the two conventions, let me just briefly summarize.
The Republican convention spoke of values—life, marriage between one woman and one man, fiscal responsibility, and God. Glad to know that homophobia made the cut.
The Democratic convention spoke of women’s right to abortion with no restrictions, the right for men to marry men and women to marry women, and the need to have more government spending and control of our lives. It spoke of how bad and selfish successful people are, encouraging “class warfare”. Their most famous moment came when they tried to take a floor vote to pass an amendment to add God back into their platform after they had gotten so much flack for removing any reference to God. After three voice votes from the floor, the chairman finally declared that the amendment passed even though it was obvious that it didn’t. Then they booed loudly because God’s name had been added back into their platform. This is not the Democratic party that my daddy would have supported.
By the way, Obama is the most extreme pro-abortion, pro-homosexual president we have ever had. How is pro-homosexual a bad thing? Obama, when he was a state senator in Illinois, even worked to defeat a law that would have required medical attention be given to babies born alive after botched abortions rather than setting them aside to die. Obama saw this law as a violation of women’s rights. He did state that we supported a similar law that didn’t violate Roe vs. Wade.
Mitt Romney’s “advocates” were men and women he had worked with and served. An older couple spoke of the way he had ministered to their dying son. Another woman spoke of how he visited and ministered to their little premature baby girl. Another man spoke of how Mitt had mentored him in counseling and helping people. Another spoke of his solid integrity and his insistence that everyone in his organizations operate with the highest ethical standards. A self-proclaimed“democratic liberal” black woman spoke of serving with him in his cabinet when he was governor. She spoke of his integrity and determination to keep his campaign promises. Others spoke of his business expertise and ability to see the big picture and tackle and solve seemingly insurmountable problems.
Recently, Dale and I were able to meet with Mitt Romney at a private dinner. Although I was not a Romney supporter during the primary process, I found myself thoroughly surprised by how much I really liked him. He was humble, fun, personable, and on top of the issues. I left a 100% Romney supporter.
SO, WHAT DO WE DO?
I cannot tell you how many times we heard, “This is the most important election in our lifetime, indeed, in the history of this country.” It is. I am not generally a fearful person. Most would even say I am pretty negligent when it comes to common sense safety issues . However, I am truly afraid of what will happen to our country if we do not turn things around in this election.
Here is what Dale and I have pledged to do, and we would like to ask you to join us.
1.PRAY. I don’t mean to just talk about praying. I mean down-on-your-knees crying-out-to-God-for-mercy praying. I don’t think we deserve better, but I am going to beg God to give us what we do not deserve. I am going to boldly ask for a Mitt Romney win and a win for conservatives in the Senate and the House. I am also praying for 4 states who are trying to pass marriage amendments to affirm marriage as one man and one woman and who are being demonized and outspent 12-1. Glad to know that praying is your no. 1 best strategy.
2.PREPARE. If you are not registered to vote, please do so immediately. If you don’t know how, let me know.
3.GIVE. If you are at all able to contribute to the campaigns of conservatives who are running for office, now is the time to do so. Many voters will decide how to vote based on ads, including many negative and untruthful ads. And that’s where your money will go. Conservatives are usually greatly outspent by their opponents plus the media is always going to unashamedly back the liberals every chance they get. Using our pocketbooks to back those brave conservative men and women who have put themselves at the front of the battle is the least we can do. We are contributing to various PACs and also to conservatives running in other states as well as the Romney campaign. Even small amounts are so helpful.
4.VOTE. Vote, vote, vote. There are nearly 60 million self-identified Christians in this nation. Only half voted in the last presidential election. Many have said we could turn this country around if Christians would go to the polls and vote their values.
If you are one of the few who has read this letter through. I thank you. You’re welcome. I have wrestled with myself about sending this and being labeled “a fanatic”. But I believe we are living in desperate times when our values and our freedoms are endangered to a degree we have never before seen. You do seem to be doing your best to endanger others’ freedoms. This is not about a political party. Then why have you written a letter demonizing the Democratic party and supporting Romney. It is about the kind of country we want to leave to our grandchildren.
I still believe we are a country “under God” and I am not afraid to proclaim that and fight for that. Again you seek to violate the Constitution and Bill of Rights. Please join me. I believe we are engaged in a much more serious war than the war in Iraq or Afghanistan. Please stand with me against those who would take us out from “under God.” I believe with God’s help it is not too late to make a difference in the direction this country is headed. There are 50 days until the election. Let’s do it!
I love each and every one of you. Unless you’re gay or female.
Rita Brown
The Ultimate Craft
So Matt and I made something together.
This is Harper. We are expecting her Jan. 20, 2012, if she doesn’t succeed in chewing her way out of her fleshy prison before then.
Now I need to stop saying that Matt’s just not into making things as he did a bang up job with her. In fact, he has been the most supportive husband a pregnant wife could hope for.
Because I am who I am and do what I do, I started this baby blanket for her about a millisecond after we got the positive pregnancy test. It is a Double Ten Stitch blanket. It is not very big yet which sucks since I started on it 6 months ago. But that is also who I am.
Soupy
Since my super self-empowering declaration of my crafty identity, I have done nothing but knit. My fickle heart has turned from sewing and cross-stitch to knitting. I want to knit everything. I want to try new things. To soothe the urge, I cracked open a kit that I bought a couple of years ago.
It’s the Soup Socks for Tots in Primary by KnitWhits. I have never done stranded colorwork before, and this has definitely been a learning experience. I knit WAY too tightly and have a lot of puckering. I of course am sure that a lot of it will come out in the blocking. Right? Right?
