Two Minutes for Interference

Have you read/heard this? At a pre-K school in North Carolina, administrators deemed one child's lunch as not meeting state standards in nutrition, so they felt the need to replace it with some super healthy chicken nuggets. The offending meal consisted of a turkey and cheese sandwich, banana, chips and apple juice.

Anyone else hear a collective *gasp* or was it just me? Really? It's not enough that pizza is now considered a vegetable, but now the schools can interfere with the lunch I send with my child to eat? Now, if I was sending Ding Dongs and a Dr. Pepper, I could see the need for someone to give something with nutritional value to my child; this is not the case. However, give it a few months and I'm sure Dr. Pepper will be labeled a fruit. It's made with prunes isn't it? Urban legend be damned.

Perhaps this is all just a ploy to earn more money for schools. "You will eat our school-provided-pizza-er-veggie-lunches and pay for them!" Or the governments way of sticking their fingers, once again, into something that doesn't belong to them, but boy do they wish it did. "We can't take care of our country, but we'd love to take over your parenting duties."

In any case, thank goodness the mother wrote to her county representative to complain about the situation and fortunately, the rep sided with her.

Let's hope this intervention isn't a preview of things to come and that it's curbed here and now. Absolutely ridiculous. Dear Government, I award you with a 10 minute game misconduct on top of your 2 minutes for interference penalty.

That's Not a Napkin

Lil Buddy has been blessed with a head of beautiful hair since the day he was born.  I'm talking so much hair that he had his first haircut at three months old.  He likes his hair a lot...a little too much really.  Every time we sit down for a meal, he has to run his hands through his hair.  Nervous tick?  Nope.  Seems no one told him his hair isn't an all purpose cleaning tool.  He waits until his hands are completely covered in whatever he's eating, then he'll rub his hands in his hair.  We hand him a napkin, he runs his hands in his hair.  We try to grab his hands to wipe them and before we can get the napkin on him, his hands are in his hair.  We tell him not to rub his hands in his hair and he...well you know.  If you were to show up at my house five minutes after we finished a meal, you could look at the back of his head to figure out what we've been eating.  Even when we think we've wiped him down pretty well, we always manage to find pieces of food on his neck, behind his ears or clinging for dear life to his cowlick.  All I can say is I hope he outgrows it.  I doubt a future prom date will want to be seen with the guy who has corn in his hair.  Then again, maybe he'll become some genius scientist who engineers the latest in all natural, organic hair gels.  In the meantime, you'll find me picking Goldfish crumbs and wiping leftover Gogurt off the back of Lil Buddy's head.  Either that or I'm super gluing a Swiffer wipe to his hand.

Kids Don't Come With Volume Control

Today, I wish they did.  We were walking out of the public library, on our way back to the car.  A woman was standing near the bike racks near the parking lot, facing away from me.  As we walked by, SweetPea started in on this conversation, at that "I'm four and if I'm outside I get to use my outside voice" volume:

SweetPea: "Momma, what's that lady holding in her hand?"

Me (clueless): "I don't know Sweetie."

SweetPea: "Is it a smoking?"

Me (smelling cigarette smoke): "Yes, that's a cigarette."

SweetPea: "Why does that lady want stinky breath?  Does she want to get sick and not be healthy?"

Me (rushing to walk faster): "I don't know, Sweetie."

SweetPea: "Why are some people naughty, Momma?  Why do they do things that we aren't supposed to do?"

Me: "Sometimes people just do things even though it's not good for them."

How's that for stunning parental logic?  For the record, I've never told my daughter that people who smoke are bad.  I did tell her that smoking is bad for us, that it can make us sick and that it makes our breath smell.  I certainly didn't want her to make some random stranger feel bad (though, hey, if it gives her motivation to quit, then...), but somehow my "you shouldn't smoke" message got blurted out for all the world to hear.  I guess you can call it a public service message!

Creepy Crawlers and Slimy Things

The other day, my 3-year-old daughter came in from playing in the backyard, washed her hands, and sat up at the kitchen table for lunch. Then she calmly ate her spaghetti as if nothing was amiss. As if there wasn't a family of bugs making a happy little nest in her hair.

Yeah, you read that right. Bugs.

In her hair.

Red beetles.

About six of them.

And, as I hopped around the kitchen frantically screeching for her to GET THOSE BUGS OUTSIDE OF THIS HOUSE RIGHT NOW! she watched me curiously, as if I was insane.

As it turns out, I have the kid that collects all the bugs and snails in the garden and sticks them in her hair. As it also turns out, I am the mom who shrieks and does that EEEEEW, there's a BUG in the house! dance while flailing arms and jumping up and down.

My little kiddo is delighted by all creepy, crawly and slimy things. They are her BFFs. Ordinarily I am okay with that. When they make it into the house... not so okay with it. Because of our daughter's charming little 'sticks bugs in hair' habit, our house is now overflowing with multi-legged crawly things. Which means, my EEEEEW, there's a BUG in the house! dance has been practiced so many times I could probably win So You Think You Can Dance on that performance alone.

I know my daughter is not the only kid in town with a love for all things multi-legged or covered in slime, so I wanted to post a link to last summer's tutorial for an easy summer bug catcher.

Make it: Summer Bug Catcher

I'll definitely be making another one of these this summer.

As well as spending the next few days debugifying my house. And doing the EEEEEEW! dance some more.

Happy Wednesday, folks!

xoxo,

Toy Story 3 and a Pack of Tissues

When SweetPea took me to see Toy Story 3 on Sunday (that's right...she'd already seen it with Dad, so she came along with me so I could too), I hardly thought I'd need Kleenex.  Of course, it's not like I don't always have some on me with little noses around.  Good thing I did.

Let me start by saying, that under normal circumstances, I cry at the drop of the dime.  Sappy songs, corny commercials, soap operas, hell, I still cry at the end of Return of the King (yes, Lord of the Rings geek here) even though I've seen Frodo sail off with the elves on screen and read the book more times than I can keep track of.  For some reason though, I've never been overly weepy over the kids.  I have no idea why either.  I never shed a tear when either of them were born, though of course, I laid in my hospital bed beaming each time.  When I dropped SweetPea off for her first day at daycare when she was 12 weeks old, not a single drop.  Not the first time they both went off to preschool, not the first time I heard either say "Momma"...nada.  Imagine my surprise then, when at the end of the latest Toy Story movie I found myself, my little girl in my lap, all dolled up in her new pink princess dress, yellow Pinkalicious plastic crown she'd gotten in a Burger King meal, oh yes, and a pair of pink Chuck Taylors, completely losing it.  I'm talking big, fat tears rolling down my face in streams.  I had to fumble through my purse in the dark for the packet of travel Kleenex and pray that she didn't notice and ask why I was crying.  Luckily I was able to compose myself by the time we stepped out of the theater (thank goodness for a long, amusing set of movie credits).

So why WAS I crying anyway?  Without spoiling the end of the movie for anyone who still needs to see it, let's just say in the end, Andy, the little boy from the two prior movies is all grown up and about to drive off to college.  How he says his final goodbyes to his toy friends as he is leaving is what set me off.  For the first time in her almost four and a half years, I actually pictured SweetPea packing up herself to leave home.  I know sometimes, we'll joke about having the house all to ourselves again someday and how quiet and relaxing that will be, the truth is, I'm nowhere close to being ready for that day.  Of course, that's a long way off.  Or is it?  I still remember one of my good friends walking his six year old sister to school every morning when we were in high school...and now she's all grown up, has gone to college and even worked in the White House through an entire administration.  The Man's nephew, who was under a year old when I first met him just after we were married is in high school and is on the verge of releasing a CD with his band.  Seeing the movie finally brought home the point a lot of Moms with older kids have been trying to tell me...my babies aren't going to be this small forever and as frustrated as I get sometimes that they still rely on me to do so much, someday soon, they won't need me for much of anything...and someday, they'll go out into the world all on their own, without me there 24/7 to show them the way.  So, OK, I also don't want to have the kids who will live in my basement until they are 35, coming up to eat dinner every night or raid my fridge, but, I think you get my point.

In a little over a year, SweetPea will be heading off to Kindergarten.  If I got this upset over a freaking animated movie, I have a feeling the first day of school I'm going to need a box of tissue.  Maybe even two.

The Brotherhood of the Abandoned Underpants

So, we're potty training Lil Buddy.  It's going...well...meh.  Most days he can go for long stretches without an accident, but he hasn't been all that great lately about letting us know when he has to go (or at least not while we're at home.  Why he's better when we're not at home is beyond me). That is, until just after he's gone potty in his drawers.  "YUCKY pee pee", he'll run and tell us.  Yeah, no kidding.  And then there are the days where I walk into a room and find this...a pair of little, abandoned undies.

Obviously, he's not the first kid in the world to want to wander around with no clothes on.  I guess I just wasn't quite prepared to see him streaking through the living room out of the blue or find myself calling out, "Son, where is your underwear?" every five minutes.  It was a little different with SweetPea.  When she was potty training, we were the ones who confiscated her undies and made her go pantless until she'd use the toilet.  Not that I think she minded much.  The thing was, it only took two different occasions of her messing all over the place and on herself before she decided the experience was gross and that if she had no underwear on that she'd make sure she did her business in the toilet.  With Lil Buddy, I'm not convinced that peeing all over himself (or worse) would be much of a deterrent.  As it is, when he has his undies on, I've seen him stand there watching himself pee all down his leg, then tell me "yucky, gross" and tear his soaking drawers off.  Not to mention, with a complete different set of "plumbing" I worry about walking into a room only to find he's peed all over a wall...or a bookcase...or the TV.  With underwear on, at least there's something there to contain the spray.

I'm spending a lot of time and energy these days chasing down a set of bare cheekies and forcing them to keep under cover.  And still, he always finds a way to wrestle the britches back off.  At this rate, I may have to resort to duct tape.  Hmm...there's an idea.

Reverse Psychology (biting me in the butt)

My itsy-bitsy baby Annelie (who is three and a half) never fails to shock me. Being the baby of the family, I find - and am ashamed to admit - that I treat her like one. So, when she does something only a big kid can do, it always comes as a surprise. My little baby can write out the letters of the alphabet? How it that possible? My little baby just rolled her eyes and gave me a smart aleck remark? No way. She's just a baby.

Miss Thang at age one

But she's not a baby as it turns out. She's a little girl and she's figuring life out and MAN if it isn't biting me in the butt.

Annelie's latest trick - laughing in the face of reverse psychology. Its not fair, really. Mom's are supposed to use reverse psychology on little kids. Its in the handbook. How do you get them to do what you want them to do when they are being obstinate? You challenge them with the opposite.

Well. Huh. Last night, Gracie and I were watching a movie that Annelie didn't feel like watching. So naturally, after discovering all the attention was not on her, Annelie decided to do whatever she could to get that attention back. She sang and danced in front of the TV. She pulled out an obnoxious toy High School Musical singing microphone and waved it under our noses until Gracie and I were both ready to throttle her. As it was almost bedtime, I did the one thing I figured would distract her (and um.. I'm about to reveal my incompetence as a mother as I admit this, I'm sure. Hey, no judging).

"Annelie," I called out. "Why don't you go and grab your bedtime diaper and show me how you can put it on all by yourself."

(Um. Yeah. My kid puts on her own diaper. Yes, I should take that as a sign that she's ready for underpants at bedtime, but... I did say I was revealing my incompetence as a mother, so there you go)

"I don't wanna," she said back.

"Oh now, come on. You always put on your diaper. Go get one and show me you can do it."

"No!" she shouted.

- Enter moment of reverse psychology -

"Oh. I bet you can't do it, can you. Its too hard."

Annelie, considered my words for a moment. "I can do it. I'll go show you," she finally said. Then she ran off and grabbed her diaper. Hurray. Success. She was distracted enough for me and Gracie to go back to our movie. A minute later Annelie was diapered and standing in front of me, hands on her hips.

- Enter moment when reverse psychology bites me in the butt -

"See, I told you I could put on my diaper," Annelie said. Her eye narrowed and she walked over to me, sticking her face directly into mine. She jabbed a finger sharply at my chest. "Mommy, YOU were WRONG."

My eyes widened. "What?"

"You said I couldn't do it, but you were wrong." Her hands were back on her hips at this point and my mouth had dropped to my chin. "I put my diaper on all by myself and you didn't think I could."

So. Huh. As it turns out, on this particular kid, using reverse psychology only makes me look completely incapable as an adult figure, and an unsupportive mother at that. And my three year old is officially smarter than I am.

What did I learn from this little moment in our lives? That I need to give my kid a little more credit than I do. She's smart. She thinks about things. And on top of that - after last night, Annelie has figured out how to use reverse psychology on ME.

This morning, after I watched her throw up a balloon and catch it for about five minutes, I went back to my computer and email checking/Facebook status updating.

"Hey, lookit me, lookit me!" she called out for a few minutes. I wasn't paying attention to her. I had, after all, already spent a good five minutes watching her. But then she stopped. The wheels were clearly turning in her head.

"Mommy, don't lookit me," she said half a second later.

Of course I looked up.

Man. Mothering this kid is going to be a wild ride.

xoxo,

Liar, Liar Pants On Fire

My husband is a low down, rotten, fibber.  He tells horrible, vicious lies to my four year old... about me.  Alright, so maybe they aren't horrible and, OK, they aren't really vicious, but they are ridiculous stories about me that she instantly believes.

Need proof?  A few weeks ago we were sitting in the breakfast nook, enjoying dinner.  The kids were feasting on (among other things) little cups of Dole pineapple nibblets.  Out of nowhere I hear, "When Mommy lived in Hawaii, she used to pick pineapples!"  I look up and give The Man the dirtiest look I could muster up, which, if you know me, isn't all that menacing.

Sweet Pea: "You DID?"
Me: "No SweetPea, Daddy's being silly.  He's just joking."

I shoot the "stink eye" in his direction again.

I thought our little conversation had set the record straight.  That was, until last night at dinner.  SweetPea was, as always, ever so slowly eating while she was looking over her placemat with a map of the US.  She was retracing the car trip we'd just taken from Houston to Orlando with her finger, when she glanced over to the left side of map.  She pointed to the little islands in the inset picture...

SweetPea: "That's Hawaii, where you were born, Mommy!"
Me: "You're right, SweetPea"
SweetPea: "You used to pick pineapples there."
Me: (rolling eyes) "No Sweetie, I didn't pick pineapples."
SweetPea: (in a sing song voice): "Yeees you diiiid!"

The Man is laughing so hard I'm surprised he didn't shoot rice out of his nose.

Fabulous...my kid believes one of the oldest cliches in the universe about living in Hawaii...about me.  She might as well believe that I used to run around Waikiki in a grass skirt dancing the hula with a surfboard tucked under my arm and a tiki idol around my neck.  I'll have the world know, I haven't worn a grass skirt since I stopped dancing hula in the 3rd grade, I never owned a surfboard, though I did have a boogie board and I have never, ever owned a tiki idol.  Oh wait...there were those tiki idol bookends...but those were my parent's...cough, cough.  OK, well, I stand by the pineapple statement.  The closest I've ever come to picking a pineapple was off the shelf in the produce section at the grocery store.  Alright, so I went to a high school that, when opened in 1973 was built in the middle of the pineapple fields...but I never...picked...pineapples.  Period.

I'm pretty disturbed about these all these lies flying around.  Mostly, I'm upset I haven't found a good story to make up and tell SweetPea about him.  Maybe I'll tell her that her dad is really an alien from outer space...or that he's a really werewolf.  Yeeeaaaaahhh...that'll work!

Boys, Guys, Girls, and Olds

Actual Conversation with a 3 Year Old

Mom - Hey Gage, do you know the difference between girls and boys?
Gage - Yup. Momma is a girl.

Mom - Is Daddy a boy?
Gage - No

Mom - What do you mean no? Sure Dad is a boy.
Gage - No. Dad is a guy, not a boy.

Mom - *Lots and Lots of snickering*

Mom - What about the rest of your family buddy, what are they?
Gage - My unkies are boys and Grammy is a girl and Pappy is a boy

Mom - What about your Grandma Debba, whats she?
Gage - She's a girl

Mom - And Great Grandma Bubba, what is she?
Gage - She's an old.

Hmm...That Doesn't Go There

As a parent, you should know something's up when you're sitting at the dinner table, one of your kids is giggling like crazy and has a finger up his or her nose.  The other night, it happened to us.  As you can see from this picture, whatever was going on was making Lil Buddy smile.  For my part, I wouldn't have guessed anything was wrong...well... other than the fact that he had his finger in his nose at the dinner table.  It was Dad who caught the whole scene...

The Man: (laughing) "What did you put in your nose?"

Lil Buddy: "Giggle, giggle, giggle"

The Man: "Did you put rice in your nose?"

Lil Buddy: "Riiiiccee.  Nose. Giggle, giggle, giggle"

The Man holds Lil Buddy's head back.  Oh no, it's not just rice up there, it's the pilaf that was in with the rice.  A nice, big piece too.

We weren't quit sure how long it was going to take to work itself out, but while he was getting a bath, a bit of water got up his nose and he sneezed it out.  Yep...a nice big, gooey, boogy covered piece of pilaf. MMMM.

This is a first for us.  SweetPea has done some questionable things in her four years of life, but never has she put things up her nose (other than just her finger that is...come on, she is a kid.)  I have no idea what motivated Lil Buddy to do it, but I sure hope it ends with that piece of rice.  I really don't want to find myself dragging him into the ER to have some toy or other larger piece of food out of there!

Actual Conversation

Me: Umm, Gage were you eating crayons?
Gage: No mama, I was coloring with the crayons in my Curious George book.
Me: Are you sure you didn't take just one bite of a crayon?
Gage: No! I was just coloring.
Me: You didn't even put one into your mouth? Maybe the orange one?
Gage: Nope.

My kids are little liars.
If there is a way that they can get out of being in trouble for doing something that they know is wrong they do exactly what their instincts tell them to do: lie through their orange colored teeth.

I swear it my boys live in an alternate reality were it's a-ok to throw toys across the house and often at each other, jump off of the sofa onto piles of pillows and blankets, and apparently eat crayons. Unfortunately telling them no isn't really pleading my case anymore and the punishments I dish out don't seem to be working.

I could send them to their bedroom ... which is filled with toys
I could take away the tv and video games ... but that would just leave them to pout and whine and annoy the crap out of me.
I could go the time out route ... which totally doesn't faze my kids in the least.

Perhaps its time that I get creative.

15 (OK, Maybe 20) Minutes of My Life I'll Never Get Back

...a/k/a, "The Day Alyssa Completely Lost Her Mind".  What can I say other than...you now have proof that sometimes a curious mind is a bad thing.

So let me back up a little...SweetPea loves My Little Pony.  More importantly...secretly...so have I for a very long time.  Maybe it's because I wanted a real horse and never got one (cue the sad music...sniff, sniff).  Maybe it's because they were launched in 1983, when I was 12 and going through a phase where I was trying to prove to the world I wasn't a little girl anymore...which meant I wouldn't have been caught dead with one, even if I really...really wanted one.  Whatever the reason, I've pent up years worth of wanting a chance to play with My Little Pony...and opportunity knocked when SweetPea came along.  She didn't always love the Ponies.  I brought home her very first one when she was just short of two years old.  We were getting ready to move to Houston...The Man had moved down ahead of us and we were staying with my mom...SweetPea was falling in love with horses (she had a plastic stallion figurine she picked out at Target) and I thought "ooh...here's my chance to bring home My Little Pony!"  SweetPea loved her Pony...for about a day, then found her no more interesting than her stallion.  I admit...I was a little bummed at her lack of enthusiasm.  After all, how was I going to justify bringing home more ponies for me her to play with if she wasn't interested?  Then...about six months later, it happened.  Rainbow Dash (the Pony I bought her) suddenly became worthy to play with...and take on car rides...and to sleep with.  I had it...my in.  Fate must have known what it was doing...next thing I know, McDonalds is putting My Little Pony in Happy Meals...people are giving her more Ponies for Christmas (I have no idea who might have hinted that I she would want more of them)...we had Pony DVD's...yep...we were on a roll.  Next thing I know, she's asking for them by name..."Mommy, Scootaloo needs more pony friends.  She'd like her sister Cherilee...can Santa bring Cherilee?"  I created a Pony fan.

OK...so what does any of this have to do with the picture? Weeeeellllll...for Christmas one of my friends got SweetPea a DVD of the live My Little Pony stage show...and knowing she has a birthday coming up, she started to ask for Ponies from the DVDs...Ponies that are no longer sold in stores.  So what did I do?  I started trolling eBay for older, previously owned "G3" (seriously, don't even ask) Ponies.  As you might imagine, My Little Pony collecting is a serious business...and I was lucky to find the Pony she really wanted in an eBay store.  While I was looking at them, I marveled at how "like new" a lot of the pony manes were...then learned (this is why me + Google = scary) there was a whole method for reconditioning Pony hair.  Being the sickly curious mind I am...I had to give it a try....hence...the picture.  Seems you take one frizzy Pony...rub in a little conditioner through the hair (like how I found use for one of those "free in your hotel room" conditioners?)...run the hair under very hot tap water...pat dry...then...brace yourself...take a straightening iron to it.  Oh yes...yes I did.  Imagine me...standing in my bathroom flat ironing Scootaloo's hair (very low heat setting, thank you).  20 minutes later...well, you can see.

When I was all done, I proudly walked out and showed SweetPea the fruits of my effort.  I tell her "Look...I made Scootaloo's hair all pretty!" to which she replied..."Mommy...what did you do...Scootaloo's hair is so...big."  Whoa, whoa, whoa...I totally did not give Scootaloo 80's "mall hair".  "You don't like it?" I ask (crushed).  "I DO like it Mommy...thank you!"  WHEW.

So...there you have it...20 minutes of my life I'll never see again!

And That's the Honest Truth

Still without my dishwasher, and Jim out with his co-workers, it was me and the girls and I was stumped for dinner. It's hard to cook when you hate doing it anyway, but the thought of hand washing every pot/pan/cooking utensil makes it that much harder to get motivated. So I packed up the girls and we headed to the grocery store to see what they had in their deli department.

Both girls decided on chicken tenders and jojos. It would be a few minutes befor the tenders were ready, so we just stood there next to the counter and waited. Before long, an older woman in a scooter got behind us in line. Ryah took one look at her and loudly said, "Scary!" Then Peri followed suit and the two of them kept repeating "scary" while staring at the woman. I kept trying to hush them and tell them that that wasn't nice and to stop it. I couldn't even look at the woman, who wasn't helping her "scary" status with the perma-scowl on her face (no we didn't put it there, she came in with it). What was taking those chicken tenders so long?

I don't really know what I should have done; I was so embarrassed. Tell the woman I was sorry my kids were so honest? I think if she'd had a sense of humor about it, I would have just apologized and laughed it off, but I hate to say that my girls might have had a point. She scared me. And I don't think she saw any innocence in my girls.

This isn't the first time my girls have "just been honest" but it is the first time it's affected someone other than Jim or me. I'm used to comments like "you are stinky" (yeah, I guess they notice when I don't bother to shower) or "this is yucky" (there's my cooking motivation). I suppose it was bound to extend past immediate family sometime. On the one hand, I love the honesty of children. They're the ones you should ask if those jeans make your butt look fat, because they'll tell ya. But how do you instill tact and honesty at the same time?

I only hope we don't have any more run ins with "scary" people anytime soon. Just in case, I picked up a deli pizza so we wouldn't have to venture back to the grocery this weekend.

You Better Watch Out, You Better Not Cry...

How many times have you pulled the "Santa won't bring you any presents if you keep acting like that" card? I must have sang "Santa Clause is coming to town" 100 times today, in hopes of getting my rebellious 3 year old to knock off the attitude. Eventually I stuck her on a time out chair facing the wall for the rest of day/night, with the decision of taking back all of her gifts (most of them came from garage sales, crap) and replacing all of her goodies with coal.

And then I came across this picture from last year, of my Elie sitting on Santa's lap.

If Santa is at all the same this year, as he was last year, then my threats are needless and I can put them away.


No... yeah. That really happened.

Do you have an awful Santa picture? Drunk Santa? Skinny Santa? Bald Santa? Share them with us! Add the picture to our flickr group (seriously friends, why aren't you all flooding our group with your family pictures?), and then leave the link here for all of us in a comment.

Fly Heads, Fly Heads, Rolly Polly Fly Heads...

See that guilty look?

The other day I was sitting over on the couch, pumping some good-as-gold breast milk for the little one, when a blanket of silence fell over the house. It never gets quiet like that, not even at 3am when everybody is sleeping.

Where is everybody, and what are they getting into?

I turned around, hands still holding my cold plastic suction cups in place, and there in the very back of the room, standing at the window sill, was my 11 month old son (who, even though he likes pink glittery hair bows and his sisters dolls, hes proving to be all boy), getting himself into a heap of trouble.

By this point, I'm in fire hose mode, and literally cannot stop pumping.

"Eleanore! GET CHARLIE!", I shouted from my end of the house to hers. I'm not sure what GET CHARLIE was supposed to mean, or how I expected her to interpret it (as she sat watching his every movie, giggling), but at this point I didn't care if she knocked him down in a football style tackle. I just wanted him to STOP.

Yes! That's it! "Eleanore, smack his hand! Knock him down! Get brother! Get him!", I started yelling. The sudden chaos interrupted my milk supply, so I ditched the tube connected bottles, and ran boobs-out (really, I didn't tuck them back into my bra until somewhere around the dining room table) across the room, and pulled my innocent little boy, off of a not so innocent, fly trap.


These fly traps have made our lives a heck of a lot easier (as gross as they may be). When I worked at Lane Bryant, one of my coworkers told me about a "clear sticky window bug trap" during a conversation about the fly infestation that we had been dealing with. Since then, I've told everyone I know about them, and everyone agrees that they're a million times better than the awful brown hang-from-the-ceiling coil traps.

Anyways.

There was Charlie, both hands buried in a fly graveyard. I swooshed him over to the kitchen sink, which was full of dirty dishes (of course, it adds to the atmosphere), and started plucking fly heads off of the tips of his fingers. Literally, fly heads. Not the bodies, just the heads. And its not like they came off easily, they were practically melted onto his skin, soaked in trap glue. It was, disgusting.

After I freed his fingers from itty bitty eyeballs, I noticed little things all over his face, they kind of looked like eyelashes? And little things in his hair. LEGS. WINGS. BODY PARTS THAT HAVE BEEN MELTING IN THE SUN OFF AND ON EVERY DAY FOR SIX MONTHS.

My gag reflex somehow kept it to a minimum, but the entire time I was shouting "Yuck yuck yuck Charlie! Yuck Yuck! No! No Charlie! That is yucky! You are BAD!" long after all of the flies had been disposed of, and Charlie had been cleaned from head to toe at least 10 times.

I will never get the image of my infant standing by himself at the back window, the sun shining down on his chubby little baby cheeks, his leg rolls glistening like the skin of a Stephanie Meyer made vampire- absolutely covered in bug body parts, out of my head.

And so it begins...

Thanks A Lot

I'm thankful for lots of things. There's the obvious ones, like good health, my loving husband, happy kids, a warm home... all very important stuff and ones that I do my very best not to take for granted for even a second.

But then I'm also thankful for the ridiculous things in life. Things like my non-napping 2-year-old who, after getting chucked into her room on time-out for flushing a cheerleading pom pom down the toilet, decided to fall asleep for the first time in ages.

Yes, she fell asleep in a tiny little box... but whatever, she still took a nap, which is a miracle, as far as I'm concerned. That nap gave me a whole 20 minutes of Annelie-free time, which is pretty darned rare.

And yeah, okay, the wretched little beast flushed a cheerleading pom pom down the toilet, but isn't she so darned adorable tucked up inside that little box? Thanks a lot for making me smile, kid of mine.

That funky little 2-year-old never fails to crack me up and remind me to enjoy the ridiculous things in life. Life is short and should be enjoyed. Always. Take a minute to look around, admire your kid's goofy grins and the silly way they dress themselves, their scribble-scrabble artwork and their annoying way of wanting only hot dogs for dinner.

Go on... enjoy the ridiculous things, and don't forget to be thankful for them this holiday season!

xoxo,

PS, I just gotta give my hubby credit for finding Annelie in the box and snapping a photo. Thanks, Hon!

How Was Your Day?

If it hadn't actually just happened, I wouldn't have believed it. Today started out like any other day, just me and the girls and a trip to the grocery store. Peri didn't have any school today, but shopping had to get done, so I reluctantly took both girls. As we put on our coats, before we left the house, I reminded the girls that they had to be good in the store. They assured me they would so that they could stop by the bakery and get a free cookie.

Before we even got through the automatic door, they started acting up. I'm one of "those" moms who gets the ginormous shopping cart with the car attached to the front that the kids can sit in. But I'm doing it to save your sanity and mine. And it usually works. But not today. After getting them in it, they almost immediately start whining with the whole "she's touching me" bit. Okay, girls, knock it off or no cookies.

We zig-zag through the aisles and the girls get increasingly more annoying and no longer want to stay in the cart. Every time I stop to get something, one of them climbs out. Why don't they install 5 point harnesses with a freakin' lock on these things? "Mommmmmeeeeeeeee, I want a cookie." "That's nice Peri, you have to be good or you won't get one." "Mommmmmeeeeeee, I don't like this. Mommmmmeeeeee, I want a cookie. "And I want you to stop whining and be a good girl." "But Mommmmmmeeeeee..." "Words cannot express how much I don't care right now. Sit down, be good, or no cookies." We have this conversation at least five times.

I eventually have to separate the two and put Ryah in the front of the cart with me. Once we get to the bakery, I have every intention of not giving either of them a cookie. I just want a loaf of French Bread and I will be on my way. Unfortunately, once I get it, the gal working in the bakery says the C word to the girls. Damn.

As if shopping with them isn't bad enough, they keep at it. As soon as we get home, both girls go to timeout. Peri to her bed and Ryah on the stool with her nose in the corner. There's no talking in timeout, but Ryah keeps repeating, "Mommmmmeeeeeee!" I move the stool to four different locations, so she won't open doors, bang on walls or whine at me. She ends up in my bedroom and proceeds to dump all of the dirty clothes out of the hampers while I'm gone. Um, apparently you never want to get out of timeout.

My girls are lucky to survive long enough to have lunch. Then I hear it, a bus out front. Wait, what? I look at my calendar, so sure it's Veterans Day. OMG, are you kidding me? You mean I could have sent Peri to preschool this morning and only dealt with one child?!!!! ARGH! "Hurry, Peri get out of your leotard and put your clothes back on, you're going to school." I apologize profusely to the bus driver, for not being prepared, and send Peri on her way. Well, at least I only have one child left. One who has just locked me out of the house! Is there a kick me sign on my back? "Open the door Ryah.... Ryah!" Grrrr. I have to go through the maze in the garage to get back inside. "Straight to bed with you, child!"

About a half hour later I get a phone call, "Peri isn't feeling well. You need to come and get her." Ah man. I go get Ryah, who not only hasn't stayed in her bed for naps, but she's under Peri's bed and has pulled out all of the storage items underneath it. Don't have time to scold her now. Gotta go get Peri.

She has a headache and moans and groans on the couch, but only when I look at her.
Let's turn on a movie, The Nightmare Before Sanity, er, Christmas.

And here we are. I'm counting down the minutes 'til bedtime and I may have to send them to bed early. Jim has school tonight, so it's just me and the girls, no breaks. Someone please pass me some alcohol stat!!!! I need a timeout. How was your day?

Re-posted from my regular blog Winklepots and Random Thoughts.

Terribly Two

I really should have known better.

Brayden was a handful when he was in his terrible twos. Everyone (myself included) always attributed it was in part due to the fact that he was a boy and supposedly boys are more rowdy than girls. Obviously I don't have much to base that comparison on. We went through tantrums, destructive phases, crying, fighting, horsing around, all of that normal good old fashioned kid stuff that moms love.

But in comparison to Gage, Brayden was a little angel.

Now let me just make this point here clear (and possibly embarrass myself a bit in the process). I am the oldest of four children. I have three younger brothers, so some part of me really should have known what I was in for when I had boys. Yeah ... my expectations weren't even close.

Gage Michael certainly looks sweet, but behind those big brown eyes is a child who is absolutely determined to do things his way and his way alone, to heck with what Mom and Dad say. That determination is always fueled with a never ending amount of whirl wind energy and a ferocious tenacity. Gage is independent, which should be a good thing, but is more than often not. particularly when it leads him to some of his finer exploits.

When he's doing something naughty like scaling the furniture like a monkey and I yell "Stop it, Gage!" I am greeted with the calm and cool reply of "Just leave me alone Momma."

When I'm packing up etsy orders and turn my back for a fraction of a second he pulls out the crayon he's been concealing and draws all over 100 brand spanking new business cards.

When I'm writing out bills and have to run to the bathroom I return to find that my entire checkbook has been filled out with scribbles and my son now has a black BIC moustache

But yesterday - yesterday took the cake. The husband and I, along with Gage, went out to pick up a few presents for a birthday party we were going to. (Brayden stayed with his Grandma, because typical to any 6 year old boy, he wasn't shopping in the "pink girly aisles"). We decided to meet up with a friend and her mom for a coffee, and a chocolate milk for Gage, at Starbucks and sit and chat for a few minutes before heading back out to run errands.

I love Starbucks.

Children do NOT like Starbucks. Or at least my child does not like Starbucks.

Gage got bored, because really, how long can a two year old sit still while grown ups drink coffee. And in a flash of a second, he was up and out of his chair and pulling the fire alarm from the little red box on the wall.

And then the sirens came.

Not only did the alarms sound in Starbucks, but the whole building complex .... all 10 or so stores.

And the fire department came.

Not one little truck, oh no. But 3 or 4 of the biggest ones they had since it was an entire shopping complex's alarms that sounded.

And the ambulances came.

And the police officers came.

And I. was. mortified.

That right there is MY boy.
Give me strength!

Guilty!

Today, I was summoned to Federal Court for jury duty. It was inevitable. Ever since registering to vote, they somehow snag me every two years. While I certainly wasn't looking forward to it, there's always a certain amount of intrigue involved, especially when it's a Federal case.

I was in it for the long haul; Jim had taken the day off to stay home with the kids, and run Peri to and from her preschool class, and I had packed a of couple snack bars and some magazines. Rather than attempting all of the numerous one-ways and parking downtown, I decided to take the light rail system, and after what seemed like forever (really only about an hour) I arrived downtown and walked the few blocks to the courthouse.

It was really impressive, clean and organized. Everything I wished I had at home. At least my tax dollars were paying for someone's "house" to look nice. I checked in and waited with the 50 or so other people until we were eventually called into the courtroom. We filed in and waited for the judge to enter. Once he did, he briefly went over the type of case we were dealing with and introduced the courtroom staff. Then sixteen names were called and those people went and sat down in the jury box.

It was a wrongful death case and the judge informed everyone that it would take about 2 weeks to complete and if anyone had a conflict, they needed to speak up now. Immediately, one woman raised her hand and said that she had a medical condition and she was being treated that week. The judge excused her and a replacement name was called. Me.

I walked over and took her empty seat and the judge asked me if I had any conflicts.

Me: Yes, I have two children that I tend to at home. And I don't think I can find childcare.
Judge: You need to give me more than that.
Me: My husband is home with them today, but he can't take off the next two weeks from work.
Judge: You're unable to make arrangements?
Me: I would have to find some kind of childcare and one of them needs to be taken to and from preschool.
Long pause.
Judge: *sigh* (very reluctantly) You're excused. And I find you guilty of breeding.

Okay, he didn't say that last part, but he might as well have. I felt like I was on trial, having to justify my need to be excused. I'm sorry, you want me to find childcare for my two kids, for the next two weeks, starting tomorrow and you're only willing to give me $40/day to cover all of my expenses? On what planet?! If I could afford childcare, do you think I'd be watching my kids? And forget about the fact that it's hard enough to find a sitter to watch my kids two weeks from now, let alone for the next two weeks starting tomorrow. At first I felt guilty, as I walked away from the courthouse, but then I was just annoyed. I stay home with my kids, I hardly have time for me, what makes you think I have extra time for you? Call me back in two years (because you know you will) and we'll talk then, but I shouldn't be made to feel guilty because I can't help you out now.

I admit that it would have been an interesting case to have sat in on, but seriously, how many stay at home parents are even able to do something like this? On the bright side, I did get out of sitting through the rest of the jury selection process, since I was the first alternate called, and I wonder how many other parents were sitting out there waiting for their turn. Next time, they should have a stay at home parent pre-screening process, where you're automatically exempt, as a courtesy, for dealing with the trials and tribulations of staying home with children. Then they should give you ear plugs and a chocolate bar before sending you back out into the world.

The Adventures of Fat Baby; Vampire Baby

Both of my kids have been breastfed. Well, kind of. With Eleanore, I didn't have the assistance I needed in the beginning, and no matter how bad I wanted her to latch on, it just wasn't happening. So for her, I pumped. After 6 months of being hooked up to uncomfortable plastic suction cups, for 3 hours a day, we switched her to formula. With Charlie though, I was determined. I wasn't going to give up so easily. Within seconds of being put into my arms, he latched on. I mean, he really latched on. At 8 months old, he weighs 25 pounds, that's how hard he latched on, haha.


I don't nurse my fat baby in public, I go into a dressing room, or sit in the car and do it (any mother who has nursed a baby in the front seat of a car deserves an award, by the way, framed and bedazzled). Not because I can't, its perfectly legal- I could. I just don't want to. Those nursing cover cape things, yeah that's not going to work for me. I need my own personal tent set up. But when I'm at home, even outside in the driveway or on the porch, Beware of Boob. At this point, I can't keep track of who has or hasn't seen my chest. I give the neighbors the courtesy of turning my chair around so that we're not facing their front window, but if you've been to my house in the last couple of months, you know I'm not shy about it.

The other day I was out on the porch with the family, our next door neighbor and her daughter were over playing, we were all enjoying the break from the heat that we've recently had here in Texas, and then- hunger struck. I did the usual, looked both ways to make sure nobody was staring directly at me, and then popped myself out of my bra and hushed the whining. There I am, tra la la, the cool breeze is blowing through my desperately seeking a cut hair, I'm taking in nice deep breaths of autumn scented oxygen, la di la-

OUCH! I screamed.

No, I literally screamed it.

Typically, I can take pain. I'm the queen of pain (Alk3 anyone), dealing with both Endometriosis and IBS on a daily basis (sometimes you have to throw in a little tmi, we're all friends here, right?), I can usually fly through the day with a couple of ibuprofen at my side, no problem. A headache comes along, pffft, so what. I stub my toe... walk it off. But this?

I looked down at Charlie. He was smiling back up at me. Literally, smiling. The little Vampire bit me. He bit me, and he liked it!

I've always wondered what it would feel like to get bitten by a vampire. Haven't we all (I know at least half of you have, though it was probably an older, dark eyed, dull minded yet ridiculously good looking guy with a crazy vocabulary named Edward)? Well now I have been, and it sucked. Seriously, by far, the worst pain I've felt in months. I looked around again, this time hoping that somebody was looking at me, having seen the evil grin poking out from behind the nipple, so that I could safely get away with my claim of sanity.

Of course, nobody had seen it. I then launched into an explanation for my shouting "ow!" at the top of my lungs, which nobody cared about. The world was apparently, going on without me, despite my 60 second pause and close encounter with death.


I guess sometimes it gets to a point where milk just isn't enough, for a fat baby. Watch out Mama's, hes coming after you next.