Family Dinners

We just aren’t normal. Tonight squareboy was mad at me, and after he’d eaten his tummy full with a meal I cooked, he shot me mad looks from across the table. When that didn’t seem to faze me he started doing a mad, grunting thing. It still didn’t faze me, but it caught the dad’s attention. That’s just not proper table behavior. He dealt with it by imitating squareboy’s antics.

Last night, or was it the night before? One blends into the other, daughter had a fit because I cooked spaghetti with, gasp, mushrooms. Some screaming accompanied this fit, that’s also not proper table behavior and that also caught the dad’s attention. He dealt it with by repeatedly, and I do mean through the whole dinner scenario, placing innocent mushrooms on her plate to be screamed at. Luckily I sit on daughters other side and I got to eat all of the traumatized mushrooms. I like mushrooms.

After dinner is fairly entertaining as well. This is usually daughters cue to change. One cannot, you see, wear the same outfit for after dinner entertainment as one can for the meal itself. Sometimes this means just a new outfit, sometimes it means a dress-up princess dress, and sometimes, well, sometimes words just aren’t adequate.

Outdoor Kitties

Our kitties are now outdoor kitties. While missing the litter box with a ratio of 2:1 played a factor, it was primarily Squareboys allergies that sealed the deal. Part of me feels immensely guilty. Poor kitties having to be outside after being pampered indoor pets. I also feel guilty because I knew squareboy had allergies. Not that I specifically knew he was allergic to cats, but I should’ve, could’ve guessed.

It still wouldn’t have been that bad, being as they’re short-haired kitties, but my lovely weenie boy insisted on sleeping with Alarm Cat on his chest. Didn’t matter where I hid the cat before bed time, by morning sleepwalker boy would’ve found him, or vice versa, and Alarm Cat would be happily purring on his chest while snot galore ran out of squareboys nose.

Of course I’m secretly pleased to have outdoor kitties. Very secretly, shhhhhh! I now have certified snake terrorizers keeping my toes snake free as I garden. And, frankly, both kitties seem pretty happy with more room to roam. We have a garage that while not a carport, it has all the walls needed to be a garage, it’s not quite a garage because the big doors are missing. That sort-of garage makes great shelter for them, plus, with Danny making regular patrols none of the native wildlife bothers them. See? I can justify anything.

Relaxing

“HEY! You didn’t finish my room!” Daughter yelled as I was stirring the chicken soup. The made-from-scratch chicken soup. In all fairness I didn’t finish her room, nor did I finish the patio or the weeding through of a mountain of too small clothes. Her room, however, is the closest to finished.

Eldest tests were this Thursday. The days before, the day of, were filled with stress for me. Informative websites are simply to informative for the active mind, er imagination. Thankfully his tests were all clear. There are some biopsies outstanding, but he looks good. Which is great! What is not great is that he is still in pain. It hurts my heart to see him in pain day after day every day.

I finally sunk all my frustrations into the above mentioned projects and had myself a whirlwind three days. The patio has been tiled a quarter of the way, two big bags of clothes are ready for Goodwill and in my car and daughters room is painted, bordered, organized and cleaned. I’ve even got her quilt all sewn together in a celebration of matching colors and Dora the Explorer panels, it’s just not actually quilted yet. But I’m close.

Unfortunately early this afternoon, my muscles started charlie-horsing. Just the right side of my body, but the whole right side of my body. Arm, leg, back. The whole shebang. So I told daughter I was relaxing. She nodded solemnly, a very believable nod, and then ran off. Two minutes later she was back clutching her “You are my sunshine” singing sunflower pot thing she got from Oma. Recently rediscovered during the whole mad room makeover. She pushed the “ON” button.

“There. Now you can relax.”

Bleutiful

“I’m getting old.” Daughter says last night, “Remember yesterday when my back hurt? When your back hurts that means you are getting old.”

The dad burst out laughing from the bathroom. He’s got so many aches & pains right now that his minor back pain seems trivial, and yet, that little statement says it all. We are getting old. The fact that our not-quite-five year old daughter has noticed for the first time that she is getting old, means we actually are getting old.

But honestly, except for a sore back every now & then and some other mostly minor ailments, I still feel young. I think it’s my kids that keep me young, their perspective on life, their energy and most of all their love.

Enough sappiness, daughter is also “Bluetiful”. She told me so. She’s accomplished this by moving from black special Easter markers to blue special Easter markers. We caused quite a stir in Cheapalot with her dramatically painted face.

Unfortunately it wasn’t just her. Eldest had gotten into the markers too and painted up his left eye nice & blue. He wanted to “freak out” the girlfriend. That she’d given him a black eye. I don’t really want to know how or why. Do I?

Goth Girls

It's Spring Break. While it's been 80's and 90's for the last week or so, yesterday the sky darkened up and it came pouring down. So bad the power went out for four hours. As such I decided not to go to Myrtle Beach, SC with the kids today. Dammit.

We are, however, cleaning today. In the back of my mind my goal is to get daughters room looking picture-perfect and then swinging by the ol' hardware hell for a gallon of pink paint. Or a gallon of the perfect shade of light blue for my room. Or both. Both would be great!

Yesterday it was dark and dreary, no sense cleaning in the dark. We lit candles, played games, read books, annoyed one another. Daughter found the magic markers Oma had sent in the Easter extravaganza. Special magic markers filled with flavored food coloring for coloring rock hard cookies. Daughter and I decided to go goth with the black marker.

Really, if you think about it, since we took no pictures on Easter, and these were special magic Easter markers, this is our Easter picture this year.

Marilyn Monroe

It wasn’t us this year. Or more precisely, it wasn’t the kids. In the middle of Easter Sunday mass a loud screaming interrupted father’s homily.

“MINE”. A little voice insisted.

“THAT’S MINE!” Not once, not twice but at least five times!

The poor, poor kid’s family trapped smackdab in the middle of the church. In the middle of the pew. During Easter Sunday mass. No way to escape. The dad and I both got the giggles, especially when father lost a touch of his customary cool and threw a bit of the evil eye that family’s way when the little one piped up, again,

“I WANT THAT! THAT’S MINE!”

Perhaps I was a little too enthusiastic that it wasn’t us. That my kids were perfect angels all Easter mass. Because walking up to receive communion, Easter Sunday communion, I had a little oopsy. The church was a little overfull; “Aren’t we breaking the fire code?” eldest had whispered to me early on, and so we were in the back. As such we walked up the side aisle for communion, not the middle aisle as I’m used to doing. And with so many people, and temperatures in the high 80’s, the air conditioning was on. And I had on a pretty Easter dress. In my pretty Easter dress I walked right over the air conditioning vent and pulled a Marilyn Monroe. In church on Easter Sunday.

Anticipation

These last two nights have been hard to get to sleep. My mind is racing with possibilities. Where will we hide their baskets this year?

Since moving to the Land of Ice & Snow six Easters ago the dad and I have taken to hiding the kids baskets in the house. As they get bigger each year requires greater creativity. We’ve dangled baskets over stairwalls with fishing line, hidden them in dryers and half-filled garbage cans. This year is going to be the biggest challenge yet.

Not only are we in a big, new-to-us house filled with unexplored hiding spots but the boys are once again bigger. Eldest is almost sixteen. I now need days of thinking, plotting and planning to hide his Easter basket. Even though he’s trying to be cool about it, more than once I’ve walked in on him and middle child anticipating where the baskets might be Easter morning.

Meanwhile, daughter has been counting down the days for the last week. Quite accurately I might add. She’s also informed me on a daily basis that her basket was too easy to find last year. Last year it was in plain sight tucked away just barely under her dresser. That won’t do this year. Of course I’m worried I’ll make it too hard this year to overcompensate from the too easy last year. Hiding Easter baskets is a really big challenge.

I can’t wait till tomorrow morning. I can’t wait to hear who finds their basket first. Who will be the little jackbutt munching on chocolate, following around the others while gloating over his treasures. I can’t wait to lay in my bed giggling with the dad while one of the kids has a meltdown because their basket is too hard to find.

I can’t wait to finally see all the kids teaming together to find that one, last, hardest-to-find Easter basket. I don’t know whose it will be, but each year, without fail, there’s always one no one can find. And, after an appropriate length of time spent teasing the one poor, basket-less child, they all work together to find it. I love being the Easter pig.

Easter Eggs

I picked daughter up from school yesterday. I could sense the excitement radiating off of her, that she was jumping up & down like a Mexican Jumping Bean had nothing to do with it. Teacher shouted a quick warning at me:

“Careful! She’s going to throw an egg!” As daughter came running out of the playground, arm cocked back and rocketing an hardboiled egg at my head. I jumped out of the way just in time as both daughter and teacher burst into giggles. I was actually ticked for a little bit, what if the egg had hit me? Hard boiled eggs are not soft. Which reminds me of a family favorite…

Way back when, before I was born way back when, my mother was growing up in a small house in The Netherlands with two brothers and four sisters. And it was the first Easter that a boyfriend, or a girlfriend, attended the family Easter dinner. Ton, the eldest, had a girlfriend sitting at his side. He was dressed in his best suit, had on his best, pompous, behavior, and expected the rest of the siblings to revere him like, well, God would be blasphemous but you get the idea. Of course, as in most families celebrating Easter, cracking dyed eggs on heads is a tradition. My uncle Hans, the only one brave enough to brave Ton in his current state of pompousosity, cracked his egg on Ton’s head. Unfortunately, it was soft boiled. Everyone stared in horror, then hysterical laughter, as yellow yolk dripped down his hair, his face, onto his new suit. With his date sitting next to him.

Daughters egg wasn’t hard either. Neither was it soft. Instead of yellow yolk dripping everywhere bright, sparkly confettie burst out! She’d had a great time in art class, blowing eggs clean, stuffing and painting. Not as much fun as she had throwing them at me, eldest, the dad, but fun. I wish my uncle Hans was still around, he’d love these eggs.

Morons-R-Us

Don't get me wrong, I am very grateful to have a husband who is such a loving, involved, puts-his-kids-first kind of dad. However. There are limits to my gratitude. And coming home from an extra long day of work, the eight in a row of long days, to find eldest 20 feet off the ground holding onto a rope ready to jump, is a big gratitude killer.

Let alone watching him gleefully jump out of the tree and swinging through the air like Tarzan incarnate. Yeah I am very, very lucky to have such an involved husband.

Yellow Season

Sometimes life is less than happy, mostly I leave that stuff out & focus on the positive. Yesterday was pretty yucky though. It’s yellow season here in North Carolina. That’s where the trees puff up their pollen like peacocks puff up their feathers. The stuff gets everywhere. Oodles & oodles of yellow dust.

Middle child loves the stuff. He loves to whack trees with sticks and watch noxious yellow clouds float by in the wind. It’s an added bonus, to him, that it makes squareboy sneeze & itch & snot & turn red. However, last night it was not funny. During yellow season he needs his cingular and zyrtec on the dot, once every 24 hours. And I forgot the cingular. And middle child loves the noxious clouds. Poor squareboy got all tight and wheezy. He really needed his inhaler. The scary part was, I was at work and I could hear him wheezing over the phone.

It all turned out okay, but poor squareboy’s chest was tight for a minute there and mine along with his… but from worry. Living with boys is not easy. Eldest had been bugging me all day to take the dog out. Which is weird, he loves the dog. Loves taking him out. Now when I take him out I water my little vegetable garden too, so eldest bugged me about watering the veggies. What does he care about me watering the veggies?

I found out when daughter came home from school. She, of course, had to water the veggies. I had to get ready for work, where I would then receive the panicked phone call from squareboy. So I’m getting ready for work and daughter comes running in, sooooo excited. Dangling a snake. A dead snake, but a snake.

“Isn’t he pretty? He’s got sparkly scales!” daughter yelped excitedly while dangling a dead snake in front of me. In the house. My daughter!

Eldest & middle child had found the snake, already dead, last night. They’d kindly placed it by my garden for me to find and scream for them to laugh. I, however, hadn’t taken the bait and daughter found it in my stead. Unfortunately, her whole life I’ve worked to make snakes interesting and not frightening. With too much success it turns out. She loves snakes. They’re her favorite animal.

Ticks and Spiders Oh My!

Per my sisters request, a double blog this evening. Not that she requested a double blog, just a picture of my policedog. Tada... my police dog, with eldest.

Danny is an amazingly well-behaved shepherd. Not that I expected any less of a retired policedog, technically a retired drug dog. We told the boys that we got him to keep them out of trouble and screen their friends. We were just joking, but really, in afterthought, what a great idea! We have been blessed with wonderful kids, but, well, stuff happens. And we are prepared.

While Danny himself is a joy, the taking care part is a little tougher. Our big, new-to-us house has a decrepit dog run hidden in the back 40 (back 40 yards). Eldest and I went to dig it out, never finishing because the ticks came swarming out in droves. I was kind enough to brush all of them off of him, but he missed one off of me. I now have a beautiful Sharpie tattoo drawn under my right boob, just in case it turns into a bullseye.

My Sharpie tattoo matches daughters. Walking Danny last night a spider ran into her sandal and bit her foot. Eldest tracked the spider while Squareboy ran in and got me and the dad. I got daughter and treated the bite, the dad got the spider. The spider is currently squished and living in an envelope tucked under my monitor. It says "Spider Bite Daughter, 2 Apr 06 @ 2000 hrs" and "Spider inside". Just in case, you know.

Z is for Zoo

On Saturday teacher had the bright idea to go to the zoo. Daughter & class had finally learned all the letters of the alphabet, culminating in the letter “Z”. Z is for zoo. S is for “C”. Daughter may have been exposed to the full alphabet over the course of the year, but she still has points of confusion.

Teacher knows me. I’m not known for either my timeliness or my morningness and since she lives a block, a long rural North Carolina block, away she offered to come by and honk when it was time to go that morning. It’s a good thing she did. We weren’t quite ready but the honk and teacher being outside got us all moving. Plus, I got to ride with teacher and daughter in a boy-free car! I think I have a friend.

Once at the zoo daughter was ecstatic to see so many of her friends. I highly recommend the North Carolina zoo in Asheboro. We’ve been to many all over the country, and while the Memphis zoo remains my favorite, the Asheboro zoo is pretty darn good. Of course Chawlie’s favorite part was the monkeys. After I pointed out the red butts, much to his mother’s consternation, Chawlie was not to be swayed from my side. And every five minutes after my faux pas Chawlie would excitedly whisper: “the monkey’s have red butt’s!” Looooong after we passed the red-butted monkeys.

Personally I was in awe with the tropical birds in the aviary, most particularly the Scarlet Ibis which is extremely scarlet. All over. Way cool. The brown bear was also a favorite, mostly because I told him to get in the water and cool down and he did. Just call me Dr. Doolittle.

All & all it was a fantastic day. Made even more fantastic by all being together, including my big boys who didn’t even notice, not once, that they were the only big boys there. Just having 15 & 13 year-olds for a day at the zoo would’ve been good, that they had a great time made it that much sweeter.