Mom's Night Out Is Good Stuff

Last Monday night I pre-celebrated Mother's Day with my posse from DC Metro Moms Blog. Oh, and this guy. (Who knew he had such fabulous cheekbones!)

There were approximately 27 bloggers in attendance. We hadn't all gotten together since October, so this seemed like the perfect way to reconnect with one another in real life. Call it a Moms/Girls Night Out, call it an Office Party, call it a mitzvah since Quaker made a donation to the Capital Area Food Bank in honor of the DC Metro Moms Bloggers. Call it whatever you want but the bottom line is 27 of us (maybe more, I'm not so great in the math department) were able to make ourselves a priority and have a grown up evening. Something many parents have a tough time doing. Not because we don't think it's important, we just may experience a spike in the Guilt-O-Meter when it comes to taking time for ourselves.

As we roll into Mother's Day, a holiday some bless and others curse, it's perfectly acceptable to appreciate yourself by taking some time to be yourself and yeah, that sometimes means being out of hearing range if anyone is yelling, "MOM?!"

I know why the caged Devra sings. She can't walk and she can't dance.

Last week I walked into a wall. In my own living room, all by myself. At least I can say it was dark and not in broad daylight. For the first couple of days my wrist felt fine, but by Saturday I was in terrible pain. So I drove over to the ER figuring if it hurt this badly, there must be something wrong. And I was right. Looks like I've got myself a third degree sprain, which may or may not mean I have a torn tendon/fracture.

My son took this picture of me wearing my fetching wrist spint. I look far more "SWAT Team" than fashionista, and I'll be sporting this look for at least another week until the docs can fully assess the damage to my wrist.

Typing with one hand is very slow going, and if you know me, I don't like being slowed down. Hell if it was going to get in the way of my commitment to the Go Humans Go! project. I'd already confirmed I would attend, I already arranged to pick up Chef Spike and bring him with us to the Capital Area Food Bank, so all that was left was for me to take my vicodin and make Sarah do all the driving.

We picked up Spike at his restaurant and quickly informed him of the "Sarah and Devra Quaker Oats Quickfire Challenge" where he would be required to prepare a dish using only ingredients found on the floor of Sarah's minivan; Quaker Chewy Bars, a Breathsaver mint, stale french fries, and crushed cheerios. Spike rose to the challenge and whipped up, in his head, "Cheerio encrusted chewy bar frite with Breathsaver mint infusion."

Say it with me. "I can make that in my own car!"

The idea of the Go Humans Go campaign is to bring attention to the problems of hunger in our own communities, and hopefully bring about an increase in volunteerism to combat hunger locally. This isn't the first time I've been involved with this project, and we'll be doing future events with Quaker to promote this program. We hope you will be inspired to volunteer at your local food bank, serve a meal or two at a homeless shelter or do something else to combat hunger in your community. It doesn't even take all that much time.

But you might want to watch what you wear. After the jump see why...

None of us us realized Sarah was sporting an enormous reflective IUD on her shirt.