Mrs. Ram's Jams

  • Home
  • Contact
  • Tag: harry potter

    • A Little Thing Tale: On Your Eighth Birthday

      Posted at 11:21 am by Jeddarae, on September 12, 2020

      On your eighth birthday . . . 

      I shut your bedroom door, as quietly as I could, to keep the cat out, but you woke up anyway, a full hour earlier than normal. Sleep still in your eyes and with your over-sized pink nightgown, a shoulder peeping out playing peek-a-boo. I wished you a happy birthday and ensconced you in a too-tight hug before you plopped yourself on the sectional and watched YouTube Kids videos until it was time to get ready for school.


      When we walked out to my blue Buick, I told you to look in the front yard for a surprise. Granny had the yard Sign Gypsy-ed, and it shouted “Happy 8th Birthday Little Thing” to the entire neighborhood for the whole day. We requested a cat theme, but they gave you a purple, pink, gold, and gray girly display instead. It featured a present-laden birthday llama; I promise I didn’t request it. Your eyes widened in delight at the surprise, and your grin, oh that grin baby girl, it was so wide that you would have thought that we surprised you with a trip to Disney World. 


      I jammed to Taylor Swift’s Red album while driving, and you, as always, continued to watch YouTube Kids, a video about fairy circles. You chimed in with “I knew you were trouble when you walked in” in all the right places like you were a tiny background singer on autopilot. Nana and Papa Blob called to sing you happy birthday. Papa Blob butchered “Happy Birthday” even worse than he did when you turned seven. When we stopped at the last, long red light before reaching our destination, you said your throat hurt a little. I told you to grab your water bottle, which I normally wouldn’t send with you but the school’s water fountains are turned off because of coronavirus, but you informed me that I didn’t pack it. Then I realized that I didn’t pack you a snack either. Momentarily, horrible mother guilt mindset kicked in, how dare I not pack my baby girl water and snack on her birthday, but then I remembered the glove department emergency snacks and figured I’d steal a coworker’s extra bottle of water for you. At least I managed to tuck some birthday Oreos into your lunchbox, I thought. 


      You pulled on your favorite, pink kitty mask, adjusting it over your ears and moving its llama lanyard out of your face, after you climbed out of the backseat. I’m always afraid you’re going to tumble out and break your femur or your head wide open because the backseat isn’t roomy and your backpack is heavier than you are. Your gold headband with the beaded bow twinkled in the early morning light. The sky is pink you said. Half a moon hung in it too. You seemed droopy, but I chalked it up to your early morning wake up. 


      In the library, your friends surprised you with a card. One of your friends, the librarian’s daughter, tried to gift you the library’s copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. 


      When you climbed into my car after school, you were wearing a different mask, the backup one covered in conversation candy hearts. I asked How was your day? Did you have a good birthday at school? You huffed, Yes, but I had TWO nosebleeds AND I’m getting da bad sneezes. I heard the congestion, phlegmy and liquid, in your normally chirpy voice. I made sure a tissue box was in arm’s reach of your seat and passed back the only pair of sunglasses, a cheap promotion from a college bar–fire engine red with Captain Morgan written on the side, in the car to help combat your sneezes. After you let down your wildly long hair from its daily ponytail, you sighed in relief. You looked too grown and cool, like a snuffly badass. 


      I offered you birthday dinner from anywhere, but you just wanted noodles, edamame, strawberries, and chocolate milk. You worked on your homework while I was in the kitchen, but before I could finish dinner, you escaped into your room’s darkness, hiding from the sunlight like a vampire. Da bad sneezes lived up to their name. 


      Granny came over for cake, ice cream, and “Happy Birthday.” We couldn’t find a candle. The week before, you declared you wanted a Harry Potter scavenger hunt, complete with a Hermione Granger Halloween costume to wear while scavenging. So even though I’d already spent the money I had set aside for your birthday, I made it happen because COVID-19 sucks and you couldn’t have a party. I spent an hour writing clues and wrapped your presents the night before. The scavenger hunt was so worth it. You looked exactly like a tiny Hermione Granger/Emma Watson when you donned your Gryffindor robes. The clues lead you to Hermione’s wand, some LOL Surprise Dolls, Floop, a glittery pink phone stand, the Knight Bus LEGO set, and a build your own robot set. You loved all the gifts. Your eyes sparkled and you twirled and magic-spelled your way through the clues, but I could tell that you were feeling puny. 


      You played with your Floop and then tried to build the robot with Daddy, which was a silly idea because Daddy was broken. He was having surgery the next morning to repair a ruptured biceps tendon and had been sporting a sling for two weeks. I had been outside walking and would have argued against even opening its box. Luckily, your aunt, uncle, and cousin in Illinois Facetimed you, and I put the robot away. You talked with them for quite a while, showing off your completed LEGO sets and your rainbow artwork displayed on the refrigerator, and all of a sudden, you got that I-can’t-function-any-longer-look-in-your-eye, and asked your aunt, Is it okay if I go to bed now? And you abruptly ended the conversation–because you were done with the day, even though it was your birthday.


      You met Buckbeak before you went to bed because you insisted that I read to you despite your yawns and your sneezes. We listened to Lady Gaga’s and Ariana Grande’s Rain on Me, for the millionth time, while I braided your hair. I turned the lights off, put the cat away, brought you some water, and turned on your nightlight. You climbed out of bed, no longer able to form words, and tried to turn your night light off, too bright for your sneezy eyes. You accidentally looked directly into it, starting an uncontrollable sneezing fit. I turned it off. You climbed back in bed and closed your eyes. 

      You were snuffly and ethereal. 

      And I tucked you in, my little tuckered-out birthday girl. 

      Posted in kids, parenting, Uncategorized, writing | 7 Comments | Tagged birthday girl, happy birthday, harry potter, kids, parenting
    • A Little Thing Tale: How Can She Be So Big and So Impossibly Little?

      Posted at 1:06 pm by Jeddarae, on July 25, 2020

      She’s big enough now, on tippy-toes and on ever-lengthening legs, to swipe her allergy medicine off the lazy Susan from the upper cabinet that’s to the left of the stainless steel stove. She’s grown taller and stronger but no matter how hard she presses down on the liquid Xyzal’s child-proofed, plastic cap, she’s unable to master its removal. She sighs in frustration while I think . . . When will her dexterity match her determination? Did her hair grow long enough to reach the tops of her legs, or did her legs grow long enough to reach her hair? How can she be so big and so impossibly little? 

      She interrupts my thoughts, asking, “Mom, is there going to be any fires?” 

      She sniffs her medicine, crinkles her nose, and laps the Xyzal tentatively, wary of the medicine although she takes it nightly.  

      “No sweet girl,” I reply before she careens down the dim, narrow hallway–arms outstretched to alternate touching both sides of the hallway as she goes, ricocheting like a bowling ball off bumpers–to brush her teeth. Her hair, tangled and bleached a light summer brown, drifts behind her, torturing the gray tabby kitty following her. She casts a mischievous smile, a plea that sifts twinkles into her brown sugar eyes, over her shoulder down at the cat.

      Before she disappears around the corner, the kitten capitalizes on the plea, bowling into her. He jumps, swiping at her hair. 

      “Suny! Stop it!” she shrieks, affronted, sounding more like a teenage girl whose little brother has ruined her Instagram worthy ponytail by pulling it than a little thing admonishing a naughty kitten. 

      And I think . . . How can she be so big and so impossibly little?

      She brushes her teeth, changes into her nightgown, climbs into her bed. While I read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets to her, the cat bats around a stray Lego, distracting us both. 

      It’s her turn to play a song while I braid her hair. “Alexa, play ‘Rain On Me’ by Lady Gaga,” she instructs her Amazon Echo Dot. I start on her right side, combing back her locks with my fingers, dividing it into three sections. I waterfall it three times before grabbing a crunchy section, tacky and wafting hints of apples into the air.

      “Did you get applesauce in your hair today?” I ask, ditching the braid and starting over. A whole pouch of applesauce must be ensconced in half her hair. 

      “No, I got it all over my dress.” She says, rolling her eyes. 

      “Did you clean it up?”

      “No.”

      “Did your hair touch the front of your dress today?”

      “Maybe.”

      “So where do you think the spilled applesauce went?”

      Realization dawns in her eyes. “My hair?”

      “Next time, clean up after yourself, and put your hair behind your shoulders while you’re eating,” I suggest, barely disguised laughter in my tone.

      She shakes her head yes in response and, in time with the poppy dance music playing in the background, croons, “Rain on me, tsunami.” 

      I shake my head at her and leave her hair loose. It’ll be even more of a disaster in the morning, but I can’t waste any more energy dealing with it.

      “Would you rather have applesauce in your hair or open the Chamber of Secrets?” she asks.

      “Totally have applesauce in my hair.”  A crooked smile steals across my face. “What about you?”

      “Samesies!” she giggles. 

      She curls up into a ball on her bed, surrounded by stuffed animals and stuffed animal-shaped pillows, and I pull her fluffy pink comforter up to her chin. She reaches for her favorite plushie, a small gray and white striped kitty with a turquoise glitter bow and waterfall-colored, glassy eyes. 

      “You know what you forgot to do today?” I ask.

      “What?”

      “Feed the invisible chickens in the front yard.”

      “Mom,” she draws the word out, making it two syllables, “How many times do I have to tell you? Invisible chickens don’t exist.”

      “And how many times do I have to tell you that just because you can’t see them doesn’t mean they’re not there? How can you keep letting out pets starve?” I feign distress.

      The incredulity dissipates from her face like a balloon slowly leaking air. How much longer can I keep this charade up? I want her to picture invisible chickens pecking around free-range, clucking, and happy with the palm trees and our house in the background forever.

      “I don’t believe you,” she whispers, more dubious than assertive. 

      “I guess I’ll just have to feed them after I finish tucking you in.” 

      I kiss her forehead. My lips accidentally brushing the spot where she dabbed it with holy water.

      “Good night, sweet girl,” I say while turning off the lights, checking to see that I’ve positioned her nightlight’s reflection properly on the wall so she can make shadow puppets until she falls asleep.

      “Mommy,” she calls, tacking on the M and the Y because she’s more little than big in the dark. “I know I already asked, but is there going to be any fires?” 

      “No sweet girl. But you know what to do if there is one. Go to sleep. I need to go feed the invisible chickens.” 

      I close her door halfway and pause. She has both hands raised above her, thumbs hooked and twisted, fingers splayed wide open and fluttering–creating a shadow butterfly on the wall. Her tongue sticks out her mouth’s left side, and she bites down on it in concentration, just like she did when she was a chubby toddler building towers out of blocks. My breath hitches because she’s still impossibly little, if only for a little while longer.  

       

       

       

      Posted in kids, Uncategorized, writing | 8 Comments | Tagged harry potter, kids, parenting, writing
    • A Little Thing Tale: Little Thing Meets Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

      Posted at 11:01 am by Jeddarae, on May 16, 2020

      Earlier this year, I decided it was time for Little Thing to finally get her Harry Potter on. I would have introduced her to Hogwarts sooner, but she’s only recently begun showing interest in books that don’t feature kitties. And lacking the motivation to read it herself, I knew I would have to tackle reading book one out loud to my Little Muggle.

      (Even though I am an English teacher, I abhor reading things aloud. I suck it up buttercup and do it for my students occasionally when I can’t find a better, free audio version, and I always read to Little Thing before bedtime, but acccckkkkkkkkkk.)

      And HP aloud poses all kinds of issues:

      1. Have you ever tried to read Hagrid’s brogue out loud? YEEESSSSSHHHHH. So hard. I’d rather wrangle baby Norbert the dragon IRL and have him singe off my-coronavirus-ignored-overly-bushy eyebrows (Holy shit. I have Hermione-Granger-book-one eyebrows right now.) than botch Hagrid’s dialect.
      2. I had to think to myself Quirrell rhymes with squirrel every damn time Quirrel’s name appeared in print.
      3. Was I pronouncing Wingardium Leviosa with enough conviction to make a feather lift off a table? Would it make Hermione Granger proud?
      4. Should I read all the dialogue in a British accent?
      5. HOW AM I GOING TO READ SNAPE WITHOUT GIVING EVERYTHING AWAY? HOW AM I GOING TO READ SNAPE WHEN EVERY TIME I THINK OF SNAPE, I THINK OF ALAN RICKMAN, AND I’M STILL NOT OVER THAT HE’S NO LONGER AMONG US.

      Anyway, Little Thing and I finished last week, and she’s now obsessed, even practicing enchantments with her American Girl dolls.

      I kept track of some of her observations while we read. I only wish I would have kept track from the beginning. Here are her best ones:


      Little Thing:  You know Snape sounds a whole lot like snake.


      Little Thing:  You know what’s fun to say–Hufflepuff. Hufflepuff. Hufflepuff. Hufflepuff.

      Me:  What about Gryffindor? Or Slytherin? Aren’t those fun to say too?

      Little Thing:  Nope. Not as fun as Hufflepuff. It satisfies me. Hufflepuff. Hufflepuff. Hufflepuff. HUFFLE-PUFFFFFFFFFFF.


      Me: [reading the part where Malfoy steals Neville’s Remembrall and the subsequent Malfoy and Harry broom scene; looks up, and sees Little Thing plugging her ears] What’s wrong? Why are you plugging your ears?

      Little Thing:  Harry’s gonna be in so much trouble. I don’t want to hear it. He might get expelled. [pauses] What’s expelled mean again?


      Me:  [when Harry tells Neville] “You’re worth twelve of Malfoy . . . The Sorting Hat chose you for Gryffindor, didn’t it? And where’s Malfoy? In stinking Slytherin.”

      Little Thing:  Stinking Slytherin! Stinkin Slytherin!

      Little Thing: [ten minutes later] Stinking Slytherin! Stinkin Slytherin!


      Little Thing:  Do you know what I think has been killing the unicorn? A four hundred head dog. He’s got the sharpest claws. And the biggest teeth. And 500 legs.


      Little Thing: I don’t think Fluffy is a bad dog. He might look like a bad dog on the outside, but on the inside he’s a good dog.


      Little Thing:  [in a British accent] Why would anyone want to hurt Harry Potter? He’s famous.


      Me: [reading] “It was the unicorn all right, and it was dead.”

      Little Thing:  NOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


      Me: [tucks her in, and says with a British accent] Good night! Good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow!

      Little Thing:  Is that from Harry Potter? [in her own British accent]

      Me: No. It’s from Romeo and Juliet.

      Little Thing: Then WHY did you make it sound like it was from Harry Potter??????

      Me:  [considers all of the possible explanations but my brain is about to explode because it’s the end of the day, coronavirus, distance learning, end of the school year, etc., and settles on] Nevermind.


      Me:  [reading when Quirrel says] “All the other teachers thought Snape was trying to stop Gryffindor from winning, he did make himself unpopular . . . and what a waste of time, when after all that I’m going to kill you tonight.”

      Little Thing:  [gasps then pauses] I wish Harry had a never-die potion. [pauses] I wish my family had a never-die potion. I wish the whole world had a never-die potion.

      Me: [gets misty-eyed]


      Posted in books, kids, parenting, reading, Uncategorized | 0 Comments | Tagged books, harry potter, reading
    • Search

    • Recent Posts

      • Top Twenty Books 2022 December 31, 2022
      • A Teacher Poem: Oh, Her June 12, 2022
      • Mini Book Reviews February 2022 March 6, 2022
      • Mini Book Reviews January 2022 February 6, 2022
      • Twenty Popular Books That I Dislike January 16, 2022
      • Top Twenty Books 2021 January 1, 2022
      • A Poem: Pressure October 9, 2021
      • The Books I Read in August and September and How I Rated Them October 3, 2021
    • Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

      Join 371 other subscribers
    • Follow Mrs. Ram's Jams on WordPress.com

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • Mrs. Ram's Jams
    • Join 371 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Mrs. Ram's Jams
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...