For my Mom

TRULY Wordless Wednesday

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday

Personally, I don't think the facial hair does anything to make this dude look older. He just looks like a baby with facial hair. Who is he trying to kid?

The Lady Mondegreen

Thinking about misheard lyrics tonight, for some reason. Earlier, the Oldest Child and I were rocking out while singing together that Tears for Fears song "Showing the Zebra Love". We particularly like where it goes really high and says "Showin' the ZEEEEBRA lo-ove, we're show-in' the Zeeb". Oldest thinks they are on pretty familiar terms with the zebra, if they're allowed to call him "the Zeeb". Yo, wazzup, Zeeb!

Additionally, my sister is getting some kittens. (Yes, I did say some kittens, because she's getting two, which makes me shudder, but she doesn't have any kids living with her, so she has a different view point.) BUT I digress. Anyway, one of the kittens is currently named Albi, and she's changing it, because it reminds her of Albee, a playwright she does not like. Fair enough. It reminds me, though, of my Middle Child, at 4, singing along with Edwin McCain:

"ALLLLBEEE, the greatest man in your life!"

I said "What's that song about, Honey?" and she said, "You know, Mom, it's about Albee, the greatest man in her life."

Ah, yes, of course.

But for me, the best one she ever sang, in her own inimitable way. was the one by Sugar Ray... you can sing it with me if you know it...

"Every morning there's a hello hanging from the corner of my fonce enforcer's bed
I know it's not mine but I'll see if I can use it for a weekend or a one like that
Try and understand- wonh wonh wonh(because when you're 4, instrumental parts are part of the lyrics) how to work it out
Once again, it's redicted, left my broken all open and you ripped it out."

I had to ask. "So how about that one, Sweetie, what's that one about?"

"It's about a guy who leaves his comic books out and his little sister tears them up."

Hmmm. Well, I guess our interpretation of lyrics comes from personal experience, right?

{{sigh}}

She was SO cute.

You can never be too careful!

I took my Small One to a local indoor playground today... one of those places with all the different bouncy houses and slides. There was a torrential downpour going on, and she was running around the house like a madwoman, jumping on furniture and yelling at the pets, so I thought a bouncy house might do her some good.

And anyway, she had a blast in the one she visited on the Fourth of July, with her Daddy:

But today? No dice. She was all excited about it on the way, all dressed in her piggy shirt and shoes with flowers "MY poggies! MY Fwowers! Ride car! Bounce!" And she was quite charming as the woman was checking us in and taking my money. In fact, when we walked in the door she tried to climb into the first bouncy thing she saw, with her shoes still on.

I sat down with her and took off her shoes, and fully expected her to go tearing into a bouncy house, but...no. I picked her up and put her in one. She pushed past me to jump back out. I tried to climb into a bouncy house with her (at the suggestion of the staff)...no way, Jose. She got a little frantic, yelling "No bounce! No bounce!"

I was stymied. I put her down, and she ran over to the toys that were scattered about, and started playing with them, but let's be honest, folks- I'm not paying five bucks so my kid can play with toys! She has toys at home, actually. I got down on her level, and said "What is it? Why don't you want to bounce?" and she looked at me very seriously, pointed, and said "Mouth."

I looked where she was pointing, and sure enough, there was a mouth. A great big caterpillar shaped bouncy house, with a big, red, gaping mouth, and children were climbing through and disappearing. (It was a slide, and it led into a tunnel that emptied out behind the other houses, so it did appear they weren't coming out again.)

It looked something like this:


Of course, you'll realize that indoors and quite large, that thing is a little intimidating. Still, I tried to reason with her. I carried her towards it, she attempted to climb over my back and get away.

I said "It's not a real mouth, though, it's just pretend!"

She looked at me skeptically, and said, rather matter of factly, "Eyes."

Have I mentioned she is, by far, the most analytical of my children? Can't really blame her for not wanting to climb into the caterpillar's gaping maw, now can I?

At least the staff was kind enough to refund my money.

Too fast

Small One sat on my lap today and ate popcorn. She really really likes popcorn, and starts yelling for it the instant someone takes it out of the microwave, and on this occasion I was more than happy to share, because I'd made it for that purpose. But the funny part was, she'd pop a handful of popcorn in her mouth, chew, swallow, then open her mouth and look at me. My job was to then fish the "dud" kernels out of her mouth. (This is very similar to another favorite game, called "Guess what I just put in my mouth?")

It probably should have grossed me out, but looking at that solemn little face, with those little teeth, and smelling the sweet baby breath as I pulled out slimy popcorn kernels, I got a little mushy. Because it wasn't all that long ago that she would've choked on the popcorn, and even though she's still my little bitty girl, it's going so fast!

And I was looking at pictures of her, and because I see her every day, I guess I don't notice, really, but she's just changing at a really rapid pace!

One year ago:

Christmas:

Last month:

I just really can't believe my little baby is turning 2 next month! I really wish I could just slow things down, keep her in this sweet phase for just a little while longer.

Not the Middle Child, though...she's welcome to speed on ahead to the next phase, wherein she's a human with whom I can have a conversation without all the eye rolling.

My Friday, the Old and the Small of it

So Thursday was hectic, to put it mildly, and I didn't fall into bed until 3:30am. When I had to get up at 6:30 to make sure the big kids were up, well...that was pretty darned early. And were they up? Not so much. Oldest was in the shower, but Middle Child was still firmly tucked into her bed, and when Oldest emerged as I was coming out of M.C.'s room, he snarled at me that he DID wake her up, she just didn't listen to him. (Which may have been true.)

I would've stayed up to help them get out the door, but they were basically surly, snarling, vicious creatures, and I was not too interested in losing a finger to one of them. I retreated back to my room, where the Small One was calling for molebats. (Or something.) I did stick around long enough to be chastised for not waking them up earlier, as now M.C. wouldn't get a shower and Oldest wouldn't finish his lab.

Tried in vain to get the Small One to sleep in, but alas and alack, off we went into our day. Midway through the morning, I got a phone call from the high school, that went something like this:

Man: Mrs. Momtype? This is Dean Importantguy at the high school, and I have your Oldest here in my office.

Me: Mmm hmm?

Man: Yes, well, we are WELL into second period, and he has not been in class, and a teacher found him in the bathroom working on something.

Me: (silence in which you can hear crickets chirping, because I'm not sure I WANT to know what he was working on in the bathroom)

Man: Er... I think it was some kind of homework. (speaks to my child, away from phone) What was it, son? Uh huh. And when was it due? Uh huh. (back to me) It was a lab, and he says he left his book at school and couldn't finish it, and it was due second period. And that's THIS period. But we're WELL into the period and he hasn't been to class.

(And yes, he did mention to me SEVERAL times about which period it was and the fact that he hadn't been to class.)

Me: Mmm hmm, well, I know he was concerned about. So what happens now?

Man: Well, I'm going to have to give him a detention. Because (say it with me, folks) it's well into second period and he hasn't been to class.

Me: So... what does that mean? I have to pick him up late from school?

Man: No, no, it'll be Tuesday, and you'll have to pick him up an hour and a 1/2 late.

Now, at this point I got tickled. Because while I do appreciate being kept in the loop, my son most assuredly would have come home and told me what was going on, because he would've needed a ride on Tuesday. So really, not that important to call me right now, and anyway... what a HORRIBLE offense, right? Doing homework in the bathroom at school- what's next? You know, that's how it starts, and pretty soon they're doing schoolwork at home, and science projects on the bus, and where does it all end, I ask you? Hooligans! So I giggled.

Me: Well, I guess there's really not much chance of getting through high school without ever receiving a detention, huh?

Man: (taken slightly aback) Erm, well, actually, I was surprised to learn he was a senior, because I've never seen him before, and so I thought he might be a transfer student, but he tells me he's been here all four years. (said a bit incredulously, as if the kid had probably just transferred in and was trying to pull one over on the dean)

Me: Yeah, I guess that's because he's usually a pretty good kid. But thanks for keeping me informed.

I hung up, and got a text message from my Oldest about five minutes later that read:

"Yeah, so that pretty much sucked."

Meanwhile, back in toddlerville, my sister-in-law had invited me to come paint handprint tiles with them at a local pottery place. Though I typically think that taking a toddler into a pottery place is about as much fun as taking a fork to my eyeballs, I agreed, because a)it was for the in-laws,b) Small One loves her cousins, and c)I had some things I needed to bring to my sister-in-law, and the pottery place is closer than her house. It was determined that we would meet in the afternoon, after Small's nap.

Only napping was not in the plan for my youngest child. I got her to sleep, and five minutes later she was running through the house, yelling at me in a loud voice. After about an hour of trying to get her back to sleep, I stuck her in her crib (aka "baby cage") so that I might shower, and after 45 minutes of her calling to me from her crib, I took her back out and stayed with her on my bed until she finally dozed off. Of course, this meant that once again I had to break the rules and wake a sleeping baby, but I waited until the last possible moment (and actually beyond the last possible, as I was 30 minutes late) and then fed her lunch in the car.

The pottery adventure? Bit of a nightmare. Have you ever heard the expression "bull in a china shop"? "Toddler in a pottery shop" is, in my opinion, at least that stressful. And not because she's not a good girl, because really, she is, but she did want to take all the breakable things off the shelf, and she didn't want to put her painted hand on the tile in a flat way, but insisted on making it into more of a squid shape, so that it was VERY tricky to get more than her fingertips on the tile. By the time we left that place, I was wiped out. So of course, afterward, we went to a toy store. With two 2 year olds and a 4 year old. Because we are gluttons for punishment.

On the upside, she did demonstrate her rather remarkable intellect in ways that tickled me, both on the drive over, and in the toy store. On the way over, she was playing with various toys, and doing what I call "toddler conjugation". She'd pick something up and say, for instance, "Zebra. Baby's zebra. MY zebra!" and then nod and smile, and move onto the next item. In the toy store, she picked up a cow puppet and said "Oh, wow- a COW! Moooooo, cow! Mommy, cow." and at that last "cow", she did the sign for cow. LOVE her. And when it was time to go, I anticipated a fight, but no, I just suggested that she tell the toys goodbye and she did... individually.

"Bye bye cow! Bye bye, kitty cat! Bye bye monkey! Bye bye, cars! Night night, balls!" (Why the balls got a "night night" instead of a goodbye is anyone's guess.)

And since I mentioned the signing, I'll leave this rather long narrative with the video of my Small One signing, in case anyone on the planet earth has not yet seen it.

My first Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen things that made me giggle today:

1. This video
2. Kim's blog
3. The Asian dude I saw outside Starbucks with a shirt that said "Made in Ireland"
4. Some of the clothes at homeschool registration day. Ummm... 1983 called, and they would like their clothes back.
5. My Small One hiding in a cubby
6. When I pointed to the sky and said "Look, Baby, we have to go because the sky is dark and it's going to rain", and the same Small One said "NO bye bye, Mommy! Sky BLUE!"
7. The SAME Small Creature trying to tell me she couldn't take a bath because the sky was blue
8. Keelin telling us she microwaved her pizza for 12 minutes on a metal plate, as Kim and I laughed until we cried over the dark scenario that might have occurred... (Kim's kitchen a black ruin in her flaming house, the firefighters kindly dropping her off at the mental hospital on their way back to the fire station)
9. Two rather muscly black men with longish hair, doing some sort of modern/jazz routine in the coffee aisle at Kroger- (clearly they did NOT need to purchase any further stimulant!)
10. Me, jumping up and down trying to reach the last Godiva chocolate coffee on clearance at Kroger, waaaaaayyyy on the back of the top shelf
11. Small One, coated in lollipop from the bank, chasing the cat through the bushes until she looked more like a dirt and debris laden topiary than a toddler, all the while yelling, "Come back, kitty! Helllllooooooo!" with great exasperation
12. Middle Child telling me, with great shock, that ALL the other kids in the writing club are "emo". "Can you BELIEVE that, mom?" Uh... yeah, I really can.
13. Kim lamenting the fact that she might not get the chickens she was hoping to raise, and Michael asking "Honey, did you count your chickens before they hatched?"

Can anyone tell I spent the evening with the lovely Pray family? What a fun bunch!

And may I just mention that today was a rather stressful day, so the fact that I still found at least 13 things to laugh about makes me realize how blessed I truly am? And there were more, but I'll leave it at that.

Wordless Wednesday

Delighted to Announce

I am relieved almost to the point of euphoria to announce:

Sputnik the hamster has been found!

Yes folks, after almost 5 days of wandering around the Oldest's room, Sputnik has returned to his cozy little cage. None too soon, either, as I was rather afraid the cats were going to find him first, and I really wasn't in the mood for a gruesome discovery. (Though really, when that's the case, I should probably just steer clear of Oldest's room in general!)

My favorite part, though, was the part where I discovered Sputnik was missing. Oh yeah, you'll like this too. Oldest missed the bus (a fact about which Middle Child did a little too much gloating, but that's another story) and I had to drive him to school. When I asked why he was late he said, rather nonchalantly, "Well, Sputnik's been missing for 3 days, and I saw him, so I wasted a bunch of time trying to catch him."

Wha?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? Why is the mom the last to know this? Ay ay ay.

Anyway Sputnik is home, all hail the returning rodent and all that. I wonder if he was hanging out with the molebats?