I have gum!

shamelessly showing off 1) my LO and 2) my kit

Has everyone here seen Rat Race? Yes? No? Yes would definitely be better for the rest of this post but, regardless, I'm gonna keep babbling. In Rat Race people are in a race including Rowan Atkinson (of Mr. Bean fame, but not Mr. Bean here). His character has a silly, italian-y accent, again like Mr. Bean but not Mr. Bean. And at one point he's winning the race... and gleefully runs from the crowd squealing:

"I'm weeening! I'm weeeeening!" before falling asleep, while running, because the poor guy is narcoleptic (which has nothing to do with this story but cracks me up).

Trout, today, has a piece of gum. Courtesy of Daughter. Trout, being 1 1/2 should not have gum. I can imagine all the things, all the places, that could happen to that gum. But he ran up to me, opens his mouth wide, very wide, and so proudly showed me that gum... well... he still has the gum.

I said, because I'm very bright & articulate:

"Do you have gum?" And Trout answered:

"I have gum!" (sounds a little more like "Ah ha guh!") and then proceed to run through the house yelling; "I have gum! I have gum! I have gum!" Very much like not-Mr. Bean in Rat Race when he's winning.

Firetrucks

Eldest & Trout at Parents Weekend 2008

Eldest was a huge fan of firetrucks from the time he could talk. Now he was a good talker, but he had a lisp. A very, very unfortunate lisp because "R" wasn't an option and "T" became f's. Yeah... figure out how to say firetruck in eldest-ese.

This week I've discovered that Trout shares not only Eldest' love of cars, but also his fascination with firetrucks. The cars thing came early this week when he tried to steal another little boys cars. And. would. not. stop.

The firetruck thing came just today. A big wind blew through town, taking down some trees & limbs in the process. Including a medium size tree on the neighbors power line. We had flickering. They had damage. They got the firetruck.

Trout loooooooooooved the firetruck. Long after the firetruck with it's pretty lights had left he kept asking for it, and asking for it and asking for it. Should've named that boy Bulldog. I even tried showing him video's on YouTube of firetrucks. No go. He kept swiveling in my lap, pointing out the window, and begging for a "tata".

Which, really, is much better than firetruck w/o an "R" and an "F" for the "T".

Helllo-o-o-o...........

Okay so I haven't been blogging. Wait! I lie! I haven't been blogging here. I discovered digital scrapbooking over a year ago, um, well, technically my friend discovered it and I lived vicariously through her amazing layouts for quite a while. I finally got up the nerve to try it myself... and got sucked in.

I got so sucked in I'm now a Digital Scrapbooking Designer for a couple of online stores (Scrappy Thoughts and Stone Accents Studio) under the name Piggyscraps Design. Yeah. Piggyscraps. That's me (read here for more). I'm actually pretty good at updating my Piggy blog, and sometimes my personal stuff slips in but not like it did, like it should on here.

So along with the usual "lose weight", "get in shape" New Years resolutions, I've also resolved to pop in here & update & blog about all the cute things (and not so cute, really) my kiddo's do. On that note, I'll leave you with a little cutie story that Trout managed just yesterday.


Yesterday was church. Me, my mom and the 4 little ones (and Middle Child would so kill me to be called a little one at 16) went & sat in the cry room... because, if you haven't read me before, Monsigner has a major evil eye for any peep made other than "Amen" or "Praise be to Jesus". Trout was actually pretty good, sat through most of it either on my lap, Middle Child's or De Oma's. Pretty good until we hit communion.

See by communion he was hungry and that lady handing out the host looked to him, with his baby eyes, like she was handing out cookies! He got all kinds of excited as we got closer & closer to the front of the line. And then he was skipped. She wouldn't give him a cookie. He got bupkus.

I had to take a screaming Trout of church. Me clinging tightly to a wildly flailing baby body, while he screamed, fairly intelligibly;

"I want one! I want one! I want ooooooooooooooooooooone!"

Trout is anal. Not blatantly so, but enough that it's noticeable. At least to me. Things with Trout have to be just so. Like today, today there were some good examples of his analness. We'd gone for breakfast at Panera. Me, Trout, MommyFriend#1 and MommyFriend#2. MF#2 has a buttload of kids under age 7. I feel sorry for her. So we're friends.

Anyway, after breakfast me & MF#1 are outside Panera's waiting for MF#2 and her buttload of kids, minus one that we were watching. Trout wanted to go back in and "help" MF#2. I said no. Trout gets no. So he ran off down the sidewalk as fast as his little legs would carry him, as far away as possible from me. The Nosayer.

Luckily for me I live in a town of old people (what? this is your first visit to my blog? you did not know this???). And an old people was coming up the sidewalk. The old people took pity on me and gently, baritonely, scolded Trout. Trout turned around promptly and while running, as fast as his little legs would carry him, back to me, he turned around and waved his little finger at the old people and lectured him loudly on telling him what to do. Only mommies can tell Trout what to do. Not that Trout talk, talks but he jabbers up a storm as good as an ewok. The old people almost peed himself laughing... maybe he did pee himself. For all I know he had on some depends.

Then the old people had the nerve to go into Panera's. Trout knew the rule was: No going into Panera's. He loudly lectured the old people some more on breaking the rule. Loudly & thoroughly until the door finally shut. Waving that little finger the whole time. If that old people wasn't wearing depends yet, I bet he went to the store after Panera's to go stock up. In case he met up with Trout again someday.

You're scaring the old people.

I live in a retirement town. We have 53 golf courses in the 3 small towns that make up our rural suburb. Old people driving while I'm trying to take/pick up my kids from school are the bane of my existence. So, today, I'm at the Dr.'s office w/the little three: Squareboy 10, Daughter, 6 and Trout 11 months. We get shuffled around to 3 different rooms in an hour. By the end of the hour the little three are restless. Wild animal restless.

Squareboy is laying on his tummy, playing gameboy, sliding around the room on the Dr.'s stool. Daughter is standing on the examining table pretending she's a model on the runway. Oh. And she's wearing size 0-3 month shorts. Trout is pushing the, empty, surgical instrument table-on-wheels around the room going "Brmmmm-brmmmm" and occasionally banging it into the, metal, examining table Daughter is prancing around on.

I tried to stop Trout, from the banging, and got loud, high-pitched squeals of disagreement. They used to call his dad Piccolo Pete at this age. I stopped trying to dissuade him and tried playing with him. At this point the nurse came in & quietly started lecturing Daughter... who immediately sat down to listen intently. A change of scenery is always interesting.

"Sweetie," says the nurse, "you are scaring the old people." I'm sitting there wondering how the heck Daughter is scaring old people in another room by pretending to be a model on a catwalk in size 0-3 month shorts. I'm way confused. And then the light dawns, it's not Daughter who's scaring the old people. It's Piccolo Pete II.

The nurse doesn't believe me when I explain, after all, Trout is pretty darn angelic looking. So Squareboy, ever helpful, jumps up, teases the baby, torturing him into demonstrating the squeal and then sits back expecting to be rewarded. I'm surprised the nurse didn't verbalize her "WTF!??!" expression.

Who? Me?

Saturday night was a lazy night. The Dad was playing Warhammer in an all-day tournament that was turning into an all-night tournament. Sigh. But he was doing well and that is kinda cool. Me and the kids were being lazy and relaxing, it had been a busy enough week and Eldest was still recovering from his knee surgery. Trout and I had taken a bath and, seeing as the Dad wasn't home and wouldn't be home for a while, I was walking around with wet, uncombed, einsteinish hair.

I was just gathering the ingredients for brownies, because Eldest had the "munchies' due to his drugs (from the surgery people, sheesh) when the local sheriff popped his head in my back door. Now I know who the guy is, but it's not like we are best buddies or anything. It's definitely not normal for him to pop over and say hi.

"Everyone okay?" He asked. Um, yeah, duh. "We got a 911 hang-up call from this address."

Crap. That would be my fault. I gave Trout the phone, he loves to push the buttons, listen to them beep and watch the phone light up. Apparently he managed to hit the magic combination of 9+1+1+send. Color me embarrassed. Even more so when I had a chance to catch a glimpse of me in the mirror with my wet, einsteinish hair. I scolded Trout but he just looked at me with his big baby blues,

"Who? Me?"

Jackie Channing it

Having boys means getting to know the inside of an emergency room. Really, really well. I have seen the insides of emergency rooms in 5 states now. I've only lived in three. Boys just gravitate towards the stupid (Ow! My balls!). Every time I get mad about the army taking the Dad from me for so many hours every day, every week, every month I think about the emergency room and how high our bill would be without our medical benefits. The army may pay the Dad squat. The army may take the Dad away too much. But the army pays the bill, over and over and over, every time one of the boys (and thrice Daughter) breaks something.

Take Eldest, for example, we are just wrapping up physical therapy for his stellar double bone break this summer (A Tiny Tumble) and he decides to Jackie Chan it and tweak his knee. I'm not positive of all that Jackie Channing it entails, but there's walls and flips and running and stupid stuff involved. It's possible that Jackie Channing it didn't do the damage, or only some of the damage because there was skateboarding and running and jumping and stuff too. The reason I'm not sure what the heck caused the damage would be because I ignore stuff that allows the boys to keep on moving. And Eldest was still hobbling around and moving. No worries on my part.

However, even I have my limits. And when 2, or 4, or 6 weeks later he was still kind of hobbling, and occasionally complaining, I scheduled a Dr.'s visit. And she scheduled an MRI. And the MRI showed a meniscal tear. Off to the orthopedist we went. And, then, yesterday, off to surgery we went.

Luckily, surgery went great. Eldest was first on the schedule, which was a good thing because while he played it cool he was a little stressed on it & his stomach was acting up. It's too bad I forgot my camera because he wore a lovely gown with a beautiful, poofy, cap. After the IV (how anyone can miss with veins like that is beyond me, but they stuck him twice) they shaved his leg and then painted it orange... yeah, he looked wonderful. He said it was too bad they didn't paint it blue, he could've been a smurf. I reminded him that OomaLoompa's are orange. He glared.

Surgery took longer than expected, so I got a little nervous but all was well and he looked great when, finally, I saw him. He had, basically, a double tear which meant a piece of his meniscus was poking up... that was the pain he kept feeling, the pain that had him hobbling and complaining occasionally. They weren't able to repair and therefore removed. Good for now because recovery is quicker, no stitches to heal. Bad as he gets older & has less meniscus. He's happy because now he'll be healed in time for tennis season.

It was pretty funny seeing him hobble to the bathroom with a walker (the nurse padding along besides him, holding his hospital johnny closed so he wouldn't flash his naked butt), he giggled himself and told the nurse he was having "flash-forwards" I assume to when he's old & gray with a walker.

Tongue-Ups

It's widely known that my tongue is so flexible (the only part of me that has fulfilled my wish to be elastigirl) that I can, if I wanted, stick it up my nose. Little kids are frequently entertained either by having me repeatedly demonstrate, or trying it themselves. Even my own kids are fascinated by this talent of mine.

Therefore it came as no surprise today when Squareboy asked me to show off my trick. We were once again in the car, ferrying between school and home. I complied. He watched with rapt attention. Then tried it himself. Again and again. He got very close and I complimented him on his skill. He beamed with pride and kept trying. Finally he asked why he couldn't do it, if he really was my son and all. I explained I'd really stretched out my tongue, because a tongue is all muscle, as I was getting my top teeth. He sighed in defeat. His top teeth are already in.

Next thing I know he's sitting next to me freakishly moving his tongue up and down, up and down. I asked him what he was doing.

"Tongue-ups." He said seriously, "I'm stretching out my tongue"

Being-Who-Knows-All

Car rides with my bunch are fantabuluous. Morning car rides not so much. Today, however, was a wonderful exception. Both Squareboy and Daughter were in excellent moods and Trout, while, unfortunately, stinky, was happily babbling in his seat. With good moods come questions.

"If it rains hard enough can it cut your skin?" From Daughter, because it's lightly sprinkling out and she worries like that.
"No. Skin is very tough and water doesn't have any sharp edges." From me.
"Actually," Squareboy chipped in, "when water freezes it can have sharp edges." Daughter nodded sagely in the backseat, this she had known all along.
"Skin is a wonderful thing." I tried, attempting to save my status as Being-Who-Knows-All (I'm fast losing this status with Squareboy). "Even when skin breaks it can heal itself. Skin is self-healing." This impressed both of them.
"Skin is like armor." Squareboy stated.
"And it holds in our bones." Daughter added. "It holds in our bones and our meat."

The thought of our skin being like sausage casing quieted both Squareboy and I. Having meat, being meat, is not so much of a pleasant thought. And our morning conversation drifted off to Chawlie. Today is Chawlie's last day. I am so sad. Chawlie, and family, is not a close friend but every school day, every church day, every local event day, night, for the last three years has been shared with Chawlie. Every morning before school Chawlie is thought of and mentioned for Chawlie is allergic to peanut butter. And while Squareboy can have peanut butter, being a big fourth grader and not eating lunch with the little first graders, Daughter can't. I make Daughter's lunch first on peanut butter & jelly days, she gets just jelly, then Squareboys, with peanut butter, so there is no cross contamination from the peanut butter jar to the jelly jar. And every morning Daughter reminds me;

"Chawlie is allergic to peanut butter!" As if I'm not the Being-Who-Knows-All.

I'm going to miss Chawlie.

Poop-on-a-stick

When we lived in the Land of Ice & Snow, for long, dreary, years, we attended the Minnesota State Fair a couple years running. Not that we are big farm people, but because we'd heard of the many, many different foods-on-a-stick. And the fair did have many foods-on-a-stick. My favorite being the deep-fried dill pickle stuffed with cream cheese. Number Two liked the alligator-on-a-stick and my mom was rather fond of the fried green tomatoes-on-a-stick. We never did try the deep fried snickers bar-on-a-stick though.

Today, in the car, Eldest was yelling at Daughter for me. Because, last night, I'd gone to take my contact lenses out and laying next to my contact lens case were my diamond earrings. Welllll, not so much my diamond earrings as just the diamonds. Hence the yelling. Daughter had taken the jewels out of their settings. How she managed this is beyond me since I've had these earrings for forever (in my world more than 20=forever). Me having something forever is practically unheard of, delicate with my stuff I am not. Therefore I thought these earrings were indestructible. Obviously, I had not counted on daughters ingenuity.

During his yelling spree Eldest layed out his case against Daughter, and in that laying out came across; "and you drank toilet water". This is true. Once when she was five, Squareboy dared Daughter to drink out of the toilet and she did. So of course, Daughter now being six, she is mortified that this fact has been revealed in the crowded public of our minivan and she bursts out screaming. My other kids, all boys, thrive on making her scream and now Squareboy chips in that he had diarrhea that day and she drank his floaties. The brings on more screaming and Eldest joins in. Did I mention that I'm eating a soft taco from Taco Bell right at that moment. I rarely eat Taco's but I lost my glasses on last week's plane ride and in between Dr.'s appointments and picking out glasses I had been starving. Anyway...

The conversation continued onto all the different kind of floaties, how poop would taste going down, how the different poopies would feel going down, how poop looked, etc. etc. etc. This progressed to corn poopies. Apparently corn poopies are very common to the nonflushers at Squareboys school. Eldest, remembering our days in the Land of Ice & Snow the best, turned away from teasing Daughter, the fun is soon over with how easily she screams, and turned to Squareboy. Encouraging him to collect tooth picks, spear the floating corn poopies and offer them to fellow classmates as snacks. Squareboy thinks this is hilarious. I am deathly afraid he'll do it. Poop-on-a-stick. Great.

Big and Sparkly

Trout is normally not fussy. At all. So when he wasn't feeling well yesterday and a little on the fussy side, I gave up the rest of my day and just spent it with him. Mostly holding him, some laying down and playing quietly. That pretty much did the trick. See? Not fussy.

However. By giving up the rest of my day it also meant I was less, let's say involved, with the other kids. The big boys took advantage by playing computer, Squareboy went to a friends house, and daughter? Daughter changed out her earrings.

"Look mom! I've got new earrings in! I did it myself! Aren't they big and sparkly ?!" I was so focused on cooling down her excitedness, Daughter unfortunately has a very squeaky, betty-boopesque voice, so while quieting her for Trout's sake, I didn't pay much real attention to her words. Or earrings. I quickly shushed her, oohed & aahed a little over her skill at switching out her own earrings, and commented that the new earrings were indeed big and sparkly . Very big and sparkly .

It wasn't till hours later that I realized that Daughter doesn't own any big and sparkly earrings. I, on the other hand, do. I have a much prized very real pair of diamond earrings. While they aren't that big, on Daughters little, tiny, adorable earlobes they would look big and sparkly. Luckily, thanks to my belated realization, they were still there behaving very big and sparkly on her little, tiny adorable earlobes.

Now they are safely off and hidden. Thankyouverymuch.

A Tiny Tumble

Eldest & I had an argument today. He wanted to go to work, I wanted him to stay home. Usually it's the teenagers that want to stay home & the parents that want them to go to work, heck, it's that way for much of the workforce any excuse will do. Eldest, methinks, had a great excuse to stay home. The boy had two broken bones in his right arm. And he's a camp counselor, not the easiest, non-physical-est job in the world. His point was that he loses money if he stays home, and he was going to miss on the day he gets his real cast again then that would be two days. Why should he miss two days? Two days equals a lot of lost dollars. In the end he won and he went to work.

Now if I'd seen the xrays before he went to work I might've fought harder. While I understood the part about the broken bones, I heard 'clean' break and thought we were good. Slap on a cast, wait 6 weeks, no problem. Then I saw the xray. He broke all the way through both bones, right at the big lumpy parts where the bones connect to the wrist. In the case of the radius he not only broke all the way through, but halfway through the break splits and makes a second break up into the bone. Not quite as neat & 'clean' as I was thinking.

Luckily, after a mere 4 hours on the phone, I managed to get him in to an orthopedic surgeon bright & early tomorrow morning. I will feel a lot better with Eldest safe & secure in a sturdy cast, versus that flimsy piece of pseudo-fiberglass he has strapped halfway around his arm. Or I should say, sometimes strapped halfway around his arm. The boy keeps unwrapping it. Ostensibly to ice it, but, I suspect, really because it's hot & itchy. Not that a real, sturdy cast won't be hot & itchy but at least he can't unwrap... though the last time he had a cast by week 3 he was able to slip his arm out. Maybe he forgot about that trick?

By now, I'm sure, you are all wondering how he did it. Well. De Opa had bought Squareboy a new frisbee. So, of course, the new frisbee floated on up to the roof. Eldest, being a world class tree climber since age 2 went to climb a tree, to get to the roof, to get the frisbee. The thing is, he's not 2 anymore. And while he grew the tree grew too, but not at the same rate. And so as he put his big almost-17-year--old weight on the tree, the tree said "NO!" and it's one & only branch snapped right off. And poor Eldest tumbled to the ground. The thing is, he wasn't very high up. This I can prove. Because when you do something so silly as climb a tiny tree and take a tiny tumble out of the tiny tree and break your arm in a big way, there is no punishment a parent can give a child. Except to embarrass him:

Not that he's embarrassed. Eldest's only worry is the tan line he'll have when summer is over & the cast comes off.

Ow! My Balls!

Middle Child tried to put me into labor last night. It was one of those beautiful, warm, perfect North Carolina evenings. No humidity yet, pollen levels were low and the threat of thunder far away. Being three weeks away from the birth of #6 I decided a walk was in order. Not to induce labor, but rather to keep things/get things in tip-top shape to make labor easier.

Middle Child had other ideas. Middle Child and Eldest happily (via bribery) came along "just in case," with Middle Child given the possible role of mommy's babysitter and Eldest the possible role of running home for the minivan. And so we go strolling along. Not even getting past our property line before madness ensued. Between an uncooperative baby carriage, missile-shaped pinecones, skinned knees, rabid squirrels and wild children, well, we were a spectacle. Slow moving at that. Our neighbors around the corner greeted us with waves & grins:

"We heard you coming!" Lovely.

It turned out to be a good thing they did because they happily took Squareboy and Daughter off my hands so me and the big boys could take a brisker walk. Of course, both Eldest and Middle Child would disagree on the "brisk" part of brisker. I felt I was walking quite impressively. They alternated between hopping on one foot, practicing the "drunk" walk forward and the "drunk" walk backwards to show just how un-brisk I was. Middle Child is quite excited to try out the "drunk" glasses in driver's ed next fall. I was just excited to walk about in the beautiful evening with my big boys.

Have you seen the movie Idiocracy with Luke Wilson? Me neither, but I've seen bits & pieces. It is truly an idiotic movie. It's about a guy (Joe/Luke) who through Army-experiment-gone-bad winds up in the future. A future filled with stupid people where he is the smartest guy on the planet and the show "Ow! My Balls!" is the #1 show. Well...

We were nearing the end of our walk. My big boys were getting goofier as I got slower, I would've asked for a piggy-back ride but 1) where would I put my belly, and 2) they would've said "No.". It is at this time we meet the fence pictured in the really bad picture above. Eldest, never able to resist any kind of balance-beam challenge, or any kind of leap-frog challenge, hops up & walks the fence. Middle Child looks at it quizzically and worries that it will break if he tries to balance-beam it. I, being a most excellent mother, laugh and say "If it doesn't break when he (eldest) does it, it certainly won't break if you do it!"

Middle Child believes me, hops up, starts walking, I take aforementioned, above, really bad picture and... the fence breaks. Middle Child shoots straight down, one leg on each side of the fence and... "Ow! My Balls!"

Eldest immediately rolls to the ground laughing hysterically. While I too, I'm sorry but I did, immediately start laughing, I did manage to check and make sure Middle Child wasn't gravely injured. While he was writhing on the forest floor in pain, he was also laughing. Eldest couldn't stop laughing and yelling "Ow! My Balls!" He and Middle Child just love that movie, this was the best thing that happened to him in a looooong time.

I'm laughing so hard the tears are streaming down my face, I feel absolutely horrible about the laughing at the same time because Middle Child is honestly hurt, but I can't stop. In fact, I can't stop so much that Middle Child is up & walking home (next to Eldest who is still hicupping "Ow! My Balls!") before I can recover and take so much as a step.

Our neighbors around the corner were quite concerned by the time I finally rounded the corner, well after Middle Child and Eldest passed on their way home. They thought I'd gone into labor and my big boys had desserted me. Not that I didn't deserve dessertion. I giggelingly relayed poor Middle Child's mishap, furthering his humiliation because I am a really good mother that way, picked up Squareboy and Daughter (daughter with one wet foot from slipping into the lake) and continued on home. Not in labor, but with a very well exercised stomach.

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.

Danny

All I wanted was a dog. Something warm & fuzzy. Something to sound the alarm on the nights the Dad isn’t home. Turns out kittens fill the bill quite nicely. Middle child has even discovered they come running at the call of “puppies!”

I was feeling very happy with my kitties, really learning the appeal of cats after all these years as a self-professed dog person. In fact, both kitties sleep with me and I’ve never felt safer when the dad is gone. Last night, however, I felt extra safe.

Last night the dad came back and brought a buddy with him. A big, huge, retired policedog. “He needed rescuing” the dad explained. This being the same dad who groaned & moaned & looked mean as my kitties were dropped off mere weeks ago. The dad was just beaming. The cat was steaming.

Urgh, sorry, just read Green Eggs & Ham and I can’t stop rhyming. Poor Dinghy was less than thrilled at her new companion, let alone that the new companion is now ensconced in my bedroom. Her previous roost. I’ve never seen a short-haired cat fluff up as much as Dinghy when she first laid eyes on Danny. Think cartoon cat gone wild and maybe, just maybe, you can picture the full fluffiness of my poor kitty.

Eldest took Danny on a reconnaissance mission around the yard while I rescued kitty and brought her to the other end of the house. Thank God for tons of intervening doors because I think it will be weeks, if ever, before she accepts him. Not that I blame her, he is huge. He even scared me late last night. We are finally tucked in, I’m drifting away and I feel a shift in the bed. I assume it’s the dad and turn over for a kiss… and had to stifle a scream when I saw Danny’s big moose head grinning at me.

Here I thought a retired policedog would be well-trained.

Happy St. Paddy's Day

Teacher is crazy. We arrived bright & early for the much anticipated St. Paddy’s at school. Teacher did not disappoint. Bright green glitter, yes glitter, was EVERYWHERE. All over tables, chairs and carpet. The excitement this causes 4-year-old boys and girls is quite headache-causing. Unfortunately I couldn’t help but sit down and play w/their clay myself. I soon found myself the Queen of Shamrocks as I made shamrock after shamrock for each clamoring child. Except for Aidan. Aidan wanted a four-leaf clover.

Alarm Cat is crazy. Eldest lay down at the foot of our bed again last night. Now I not only have to sleep train daughter, I have to sleep train the 15-year-old. Again. He tried, twice, to get Alarm Cat to cuddle up with him each time Alarm Cat went tearing out of the room like a bat out of hell. An earthbound bat out of hell, but a batt out of hell nonetheless. I can’t adequately describe the mad scrambling over the floors that cat does but if you picture it like a cartoon character who’s desperately trying to run but staying in place, you wouldn’t be far off. The third time Alarm Cat cozied up to eldest by choice. Then the dad walked in. Alarm Cat couldn’t get out of there fast enough. In the process almost knocking the dad off his feet, and Alarm Cat is small. Still a kitten really. If eldest and I hadn’t been laying down we would’ve fallen over laughing.

This morning was crazy. I worked late last night, a twelve-hour shift kind of late, and didn’t lay out the St. Paddy’s day clothes. Then I was tired and hit snooze three times while Alarm Cat gave up. Let’s just say each kid had issues with finding green clothing so they wouldn’t get pinched. Poor Aidan in daughter’s classroom had no green clothing. Teacher and I both watched in horror as the 11 remaining four-year-olds started to get up to pinch the poor boy. She may be crazy but she’s smart. She quickly stuck a shamrock sticker on his cheek and called him safe.

Alarm Cat

I am all for the family bed and co-sleeping, practice it myself. However. Be warned. This has a very long lasting effect on everyone involved. This morning Alarm Cat woke up not just myself and the dad but also daughter, squareboy and eldest. Being as we have a queen bed only myself, the dad and daughter were in the bed, though daughter did start out on the floor which is where Alarm Cat found eldest and squareboy.

Eldest and I have been rebonding over Firefly for the last week or so. He has some serious stomach issues, inflammatory stomach disease, reflux and IBS. I’m not sure what triggered it but he’s been having a series of horrible attacks. Maybe it’s hormones. I don’t know and neither does his gp doctor, so we will be seeing a specialist. Regardless he’s been home a little more than usual. And I decided to share the Firefly series with him. He is as in love with Mal and Jayne and the whole shiny verse as I am.

Last night he bought Serenity, the DVD. So he crashed out at the foot of our bed to watch it with me. There is nothing like having your child chuckle at the same time during the same moment of a movie you love. Daughter always sleeps with us though I am working at weaning her out of our bed, the boys were all out by age five and daughter is almost five. Wow! Daughter is almost five. Squareboy snuck in sometime after midnight, not for lack of trying earlier but I was awake then. He’d felt very left out with eldest and daughter in there.

Anyway, the dad and I both have very bad colds. The dad fell asleep very earlier and never had the opportunity to set his alarm. Alarm Cat to the rescue. Promptly at O:Dark Thirty the Alarm Cat strolled in miauwing and trilling the Alarm. Waking the dad and off he went to work. On time. At 6:30 Alarm Cat strolled into middle child’s room and miauwed and trilled until middle child was up and on his way. At 7:00 am Alarm Cat was back in my room pacing all over eldests prone form on the floor while miauwing and trilling till the last of us were up. I don’t know what we ever did without Alarm Cat, but now that we have him, I think we’ll never be late again. Not that we have a problem with being late. Not us.

Double U

It’s tough to be the youngest of five. Luckily daughter is a tough cookie. Squareboy was picking on her last night, now in a fair fight she doesn’t stand a chance, however, he’s got a missing toenail. He landed one punch. One. She whirled around and stomped square on his toe with the missing toenail. Squareboy 0; daughter 1.

A little later she and I had a conversation.
“What letter am I learning next week?” she asked.
“U” I answered.
“U is for umbrella.” Pause. “Oh I know that one, we learned it before.”
“W” I corrected. And one of her infamous screaming fits ensued. ‘W’ you see, sounds like Double U. And she’d just finished explaining she’d already learned ‘U’.

Soon after that, while digging in my stuff still stored in boxes in my room from the move, she found a picture of the seven of us taken for a “We’ve Moved” announcements from the previous move. See above. She was very sad she was at the bottom of the stack. Apparently it’s not fair to have the smallest at the bottom of the stack. She can tell she’s being squished.

Doctors, Dentists & ER's

Do you know that when you lose weight your underwear is baggy and gets, um, out of place easily? Well. That only took me three months to figure out. I’m not only in a smaller pant size, I’m also in a smaller panty size. Now back to the semi-regular, about-my-kids, blogging.

It’s been a week. Pretending that a week starts on Saturday, let’s start with the first day of the week. In case you didn’t know, Squareboy bounces off of walls. Literally. He manages this by getting a running start, bouncing onto the couch, scrambling up the back, onto the wall (think Alley-Oop in skateboarding terms) and back down. On Saturday he missed his landing, skidded across the carpeting and smack into the solid brick fireplace. At first I ignored his wailing, then it got annoying and I strolled over to look. All I saw, from my great height, was a slightly bloody toe. I warned him not to drip on the carpet and strolled away again.

He kept wailing, the dad strolled over and promptly hollered for me. Turns out Squareboy had torn up half his toenail, it was poking just about straight up. OW! We debated the emergency room, and decided to wait. Sunday, at work, the kid’s doctor stopped by. He’d missed us. I got in a quick consult and learned that I just needed to watch the toe for infection. I love living in a small town.

That night, while at the emergency room with Daughter, Squareboy pulled off his own dangling toenail with the dad’s pliers. I think the doctor cursed us by saying he missed us. Squareboy had disclocated Daughter’s elbow while rescuing her from the collapsed “fort” of couch cushions & beanbags. Daughter cried and played it up beautifully at the emergency room and we got in before the tons of other people in the waiting room, much to their dismay when she walked out happily chatting 30 minutes later. Days later she’s still talking about the wonderful doctor who saved her. He’s her new hero.

Tuesday night Daughter ran a fever and her cheek was swollen. I figured mumps or an abscessed tooth, but she wouldn’t let me check. The dad finally rolled her up like a burrito while eldest shown a flashlight in her mouth and giggled like a hyena. We saw what looked like a tooth growing out of the bottom of her jaw. Wednesday at the dentist it turned out to be an ulcer. Easier treated than a funky tooth anyway, but still painful. Wednesday also was the doctor’s turn to see us, I whined at him that he jinxed me as I recited our list of ailments. Poor eldests reflux is out of control and we are on double meds from just a month ago.

Thursday every single kid woke up with a fever and the sniffles. Every. Single. One.