Motherhood is full of stories - stories about our kids, stories we read to our kids, stories we remember from when we were kids. I have been entertained lately by my childrens' reactions to stories. Felicity is old enough now to understand more about a story's plot and Judsen does nearly nothing except make up stories about ... well, everything. "And the protoceratops (yes, this is a real dinosaur) whipped the predator with his tail..." and "When I was a baby, I had blood on my toe...", etc, etc, etc.
Recently I was reading to my kids the classic story of The Little Engine that Could. This was a favorite from when I was young and, being the noble mother that I am, I wanted to instill in my kids early the timeless lesson that one should never give up, even when the going gets rough. Plus, the illustrations are fabulous. So we begin to read this tale and quickly reach the part where the tiny engine carrying all the good things to the boys and girls on the other side of the mountain breaks down. She can go no further. We are looking at the picture of the broken engine and how sad all the toys are and talking about how the engine is stuck. I am ready to move on to the next page when Felicity begins to mourn forlornly, "Broke! Broke!" "Yes, honey, it's broken." I turn the page to move on to happier subjects, and she insists on turning it back. "Brooooke! Brooooke!" She nearly has tears in her eyes at this point, staring at the poor little broken engine, as if the desperation on her face can will that little fictional train up the mountain. Since it appears Felicity is a lost cause, I try Judsen. "Look, Jud, the engine can't go anywhere." He stares at the picture for a few seconds; it depicts the little engine and all of her toys piled on the tracks in front of her. Among these toys is a stuffed purple elephant. So Judsen reaches a conclusion; as I tell him the engine can't move, he says frankly, "Because there's an elephant on the track?" So while Felicity howls in despair about the poor, unfortunate engine, Judsen is explaining to me in a teacher-talking-with-a-slow-to-learn-child voice that if they would just move the wretched elephant, all would be well and we could be done with this story. Not sure whether to laugh, cry, or just toss the book across the room, I quickly press forward to the end, doing my best to highlight the little blue engine's triumph and how it's very important in life to just keep trying. I am certain that is not the message either of my offspring received from this novel and I am also certain it will be several years before we try this one again, regardless of what the moral of this story is.
Speaking of stories, we recently watched an animal documentary that featured the story of a man raising two young wolverines. This was interesting and something every mother can relate to. These animals, like children, are intelligent, messy, active and have distinct personalities of their own. It was sweet watching this guy teach these creatures what they need to know, provide for them, patiently clean up after them. They showed scenes of him taking them for walks and playing with them. They'd tumble over each other and climb on him, just one big happy family. How sweet. Warm feelings and memories of special times with my own family rush through me. Then, all of a sudden, there was a scene where the man was with just one of his wolverines. "Oh no!" I think, "Has something happened to one of his poor babies?' Just then the narrator announces that when each animal got to the point where it weighed 40 pounds, the man could only control one at a time and therefore left one at home each time he took the other out. Like a deflating balloon, my respect for this so-called "expert" died. He can only control one 40 pound creature at a time?? Well, so can the rest of us, but that doesn't stop us from taking our multiple wild animals grocery shopping, or to the cell phone shop, or the library, or the gym, or any other of a hundred places that we'd love to have only one living creature running around us while we try to carry on an intelligent conversation. We moms don't lock one kid up at home so our trips out will be more convenient or pleasant, no matter what they weigh (and for the record, I have one that weighs 40 pounds and another close on his heels at 30 pounds. And with the weight I've gained this pregnancy, it appears Baby #3 is already not far behind). Man, this guy is a pansy. If he's an expert, give me a P.h.D.
Saturday, October 1, 2011
Monday, July 11, 2011
Backyard Fun
So, it's been a while since I've regaled y'all with tales from our lair. It's been a full few months, including such adventures as finding out we are expecting another wiggly little Jelly Bean in December, moving 600 miles to another state, purchasing a dental practice, making a trip to visit family over 700 miles away, and beginning plans to build a home. Whew!, you say. Whew! is right. It has been full, but that doesn't mean the fun has stopped. Of course it hasn't. And so, without further ado, here is the kind of story that is the reason you read this blog.
Since we've moved in (just over a month now), I have felt very much like a pregnant mom, in other words, I've felt like a pot-bellied slug with a bowl of melted cheese for a brain. (No offense to any other pregnant moms out there. I wish I was one of those high-functioning, "glowing" pregos that is a blessing to everyone around her. I'm grateful for the ability to have children, but those 9 months don't seem to suit me well.) On one particularly pregnant afternoon, I let the kids have yogurt and in a rare brain-functioning moment, sent them to the backyard to do so, so that we could prevent the inevitable yogurt-finger-painting of the table surface. Shortly after I'd begun enjoying the peace in the house, Judsen walks in and tells me he's done with his yogurt. I go outside to check, and no, he's got quite a bit left. I ask him to finish, compliment Felicity on doing a good job eating hers, and go back inside. All is well.
This time they're gone for quite some time and I'm reading my book, thinking how glad I am that they're having fun together. Yea for childhood.
I'm just about ready to get up and look for a snack myself when suddenly, a Creature from the Purple, Sticky, Gloppy, Berry-Speckled Lagoon appears in the doorway, hollering delightedly, "Mom! I'm a mess!!" (four words that send shivers down a mother's spine) I walk outside and onto the scene of a horror film. There is yogurt EVERYWHERE!! It's smeared on the patio furniture, on the sidewalks, the sides of our house, and fully caking both my children. Baby Swamp Creature is also covered in purple yogurt and is making handprints on every surface she can find. How can 8 innocent ounces do all this??
At this point I order them into my bathroom to get clean, knowing somewhere in the back of my now-less-than-functioning brain that this is probably a bad idea. However, I need them contained somewhere else so I can clean the patio and prevent more desert creepy-crawlies than normal from visiting us. I scrub down the chairs as best I can and return to the bathroom to find a still-dairy-encrusted child sitting on top of each bathroom counter at a sink, with their hands cupped around the faucet to turn it into a high-powered water gun, the water running full blast and them spraying each other across the bathroom! Now there is water everywhere, they are both still disgusting, and Mama is mad! (Although at this point, a portion of the anger is directed at myself, because as I mentioned before, I really did know this was a distinct possibility if I sent them into the bathroom alone.)
I pick them both up by the scruff of the neck, haul them to their bathroom, and leave them to bathe while I clean up Disaster #2.
Josh gets home about this time and wanders into their bathroom to check on them. He starts hollering expletives and I run in to see what the problem is now. I don't make it to the bathroom before the flood from Noah's ark greets me in the hall. The kids have turned the water in the bathtub back on (which they know is forbidden), fully flooded their bathroom, and have gotten a good start on the rest of the house. It took us 7 bath towels to even begin controlling all the water. Unfortunately we don't seem to own enough bath towels to begin controlling our offspring.
Yogurt fights are not the only fun that begins in our backyard. We have roadrunners that frequent our bushes. Felicity calls them "ro-ro". It's really cute. We also have all kinds of ants, centipedes, cockroaches, and an occasional scorpion to gawk at. There's rocks to throw and a back wall to climb, although we would never have thought our children could scale it until one evening when they were playing outside and we were inside talking to a couple guys from church. All of a sudden we hear Felicity crying and Judsen shouting for us, with an unusual desperate tone to his voice. We hurry out to find him on the opposite side of the wall, with one leg on top and his arms full to the brim with rocks. He is also barefoot and shirtless. Felicity is barefoot, standing on the xeriscaped stretch next to the fence. It's all pointy rocks, but there she was, trying to scale the fence and crying not because Judsen was gone, but because she couldn't go with him. After rescuing Judsen and scolding them both about climbing the fence, he told us calmly, "But these are dinosaur teeth. I had to go get them." He had scaled the fence that is taller than he is, with no shoes or shirt, climbed down the 8-foot rock wall behind our house, gathered rocks or "dinosaur teeth" from the empty desert, climbed back up with his arms totally full and then almost made it back over the fence without being caught. And all in the name of science. If it's good enough for those paleontologists on the National Geographic shows we watch, surely it's a good idea for 3-year old Judsen, who in spite of the firm talking-to we had about how dangerous it is to go wandering through the desert alone, gave us quite a lecture on the "teeth" he found, what dinosaurs they were from and how many millions of years old they were.
Yikes. If anyone asks me, I'd say have stupid kids. Your life will be far less entertaining, but a heck of a lot easier. Also, don't have a backyard. It appears that will make life easier, too.
Since we've moved in (just over a month now), I have felt very much like a pregnant mom, in other words, I've felt like a pot-bellied slug with a bowl of melted cheese for a brain. (No offense to any other pregnant moms out there. I wish I was one of those high-functioning, "glowing" pregos that is a blessing to everyone around her. I'm grateful for the ability to have children, but those 9 months don't seem to suit me well.) On one particularly pregnant afternoon, I let the kids have yogurt and in a rare brain-functioning moment, sent them to the backyard to do so, so that we could prevent the inevitable yogurt-finger-painting of the table surface. Shortly after I'd begun enjoying the peace in the house, Judsen walks in and tells me he's done with his yogurt. I go outside to check, and no, he's got quite a bit left. I ask him to finish, compliment Felicity on doing a good job eating hers, and go back inside. All is well.
This time they're gone for quite some time and I'm reading my book, thinking how glad I am that they're having fun together. Yea for childhood.
I'm just about ready to get up and look for a snack myself when suddenly, a Creature from the Purple, Sticky, Gloppy, Berry-Speckled Lagoon appears in the doorway, hollering delightedly, "Mom! I'm a mess!!" (four words that send shivers down a mother's spine) I walk outside and onto the scene of a horror film. There is yogurt EVERYWHERE!! It's smeared on the patio furniture, on the sidewalks, the sides of our house, and fully caking both my children. Baby Swamp Creature is also covered in purple yogurt and is making handprints on every surface she can find. How can 8 innocent ounces do all this??
At this point I order them into my bathroom to get clean, knowing somewhere in the back of my now-less-than-functioning brain that this is probably a bad idea. However, I need them contained somewhere else so I can clean the patio and prevent more desert creepy-crawlies than normal from visiting us. I scrub down the chairs as best I can and return to the bathroom to find a still-dairy-encrusted child sitting on top of each bathroom counter at a sink, with their hands cupped around the faucet to turn it into a high-powered water gun, the water running full blast and them spraying each other across the bathroom! Now there is water everywhere, they are both still disgusting, and Mama is mad! (Although at this point, a portion of the anger is directed at myself, because as I mentioned before, I really did know this was a distinct possibility if I sent them into the bathroom alone.)
I pick them both up by the scruff of the neck, haul them to their bathroom, and leave them to bathe while I clean up Disaster #2.
Josh gets home about this time and wanders into their bathroom to check on them. He starts hollering expletives and I run in to see what the problem is now. I don't make it to the bathroom before the flood from Noah's ark greets me in the hall. The kids have turned the water in the bathtub back on (which they know is forbidden), fully flooded their bathroom, and have gotten a good start on the rest of the house. It took us 7 bath towels to even begin controlling all the water. Unfortunately we don't seem to own enough bath towels to begin controlling our offspring.
Yogurt fights are not the only fun that begins in our backyard. We have roadrunners that frequent our bushes. Felicity calls them "ro-ro". It's really cute. We also have all kinds of ants, centipedes, cockroaches, and an occasional scorpion to gawk at. There's rocks to throw and a back wall to climb, although we would never have thought our children could scale it until one evening when they were playing outside and we were inside talking to a couple guys from church. All of a sudden we hear Felicity crying and Judsen shouting for us, with an unusual desperate tone to his voice. We hurry out to find him on the opposite side of the wall, with one leg on top and his arms full to the brim with rocks. He is also barefoot and shirtless. Felicity is barefoot, standing on the xeriscaped stretch next to the fence. It's all pointy rocks, but there she was, trying to scale the fence and crying not because Judsen was gone, but because she couldn't go with him. After rescuing Judsen and scolding them both about climbing the fence, he told us calmly, "But these are dinosaur teeth. I had to go get them." He had scaled the fence that is taller than he is, with no shoes or shirt, climbed down the 8-foot rock wall behind our house, gathered rocks or "dinosaur teeth" from the empty desert, climbed back up with his arms totally full and then almost made it back over the fence without being caught. And all in the name of science. If it's good enough for those paleontologists on the National Geographic shows we watch, surely it's a good idea for 3-year old Judsen, who in spite of the firm talking-to we had about how dangerous it is to go wandering through the desert alone, gave us quite a lecture on the "teeth" he found, what dinosaurs they were from and how many millions of years old they were.
Yikes. If anyone asks me, I'd say have stupid kids. Your life will be far less entertaining, but a heck of a lot easier. Also, don't have a backyard. It appears that will make life easier, too.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
A Day in the Life...
I guess my life isn't so different from other moms'. My kids wake up waaaay before I'm ready for them to and holler, "Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Moooom. MOOOOOOM!" until I stumble to their bedroom, hoist them out of bed and then stagger blindly down the hall to the living room, where I dole out whatever edible thing finds its way into my hands first, wait the interminable minutes while the computer loads so I can turn on a show at least 45 minutes long, and then slog back down the hall to drop onto my pillow while the kids enjoy their only-at-7 am-freedom to eat in front of the TV (in our case, the computer). I know the show is over when they come back down the hall hollering, "Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Moooom. MOOOOOOM!" and my day has to officially begin.
Thus started my day, the other day, and continued with a muffin-making fest (wherein we open a package that reads "just add milk", dump it in a bowl, have a fight over who gets to stir, slosh the batter into muffin tins, and slide the pan into the oven, in just under 45 minutes! I don't know how on Earth this possibly takes so long, but I have decided that the rule to determine a recipe's actual prep time when cooking with children is: figure out how many kids you have, add to this number each of their ages, then multiply the total by the prep minutes listed in the recipe. And then add 15 minutes for the requisite tastings, food fights, and subsequent time-outs. This is how long it will actually take you to prepare this dish.). So anyway, we made muffins. And then we got dressed (refer to a previous posting on how this goes daily), we listened to Judsen give his hourly animal lecture ("A butterfly is like a stegosaurus." "It is?" "No. It's not. A stegosaurus is a plant-eater. And Tyrannosaurus rex is a meat eater. And he is a predator. And giraffes eat leaves." He impersonates a giraffe eating leaves. "And a great white shark!"), and we once again got after Felicity for standing on top of the table scavenging the remains of her brother's breakfast. (It's not so much the scavenging that bothers me, it's the fact that she will attempt to get herself off the table by stepping into her booster seat, dancing wildly while holding to the top of the seat like she's a trick pony rider, and then sliding herself off the seat backwards letting her legs dangle into the great beyond. If she's lucky, there will be a chair that she can ease herself onto and from there to the floor. More often than not, the chairs are missing because she has pushed them to random locales around the house and she has to flop onto the tile and hope for the best.)
Finally it was nap time, and in my house, that means for all of us, Mom included. Felicity went down like a child with a mother as good as me should :) and being the nice mom I am, I told Judsen he could have a nap in my bed with me. This is a rare treat, and I was feeling generous. After all the events of the morning I was feeling quite tired and was eager for this respite. We laid there quietly for a moment and just as I was slipping into sleep, I hear Judsen begin whispering what sounds like every word he knows. Why the dictionary recitation has to happen right now, I have no idea and quickly ask him to stop. "I'm not saying bad words, Mom. I'm saying 'brains'. 'Brains' isn't a bad word," he reassures me. "Okay, you're right. 'Brains' is not a bad word. But right now it's time to go to sleep." "Okay." Aaaaah. Once again, silence. The sleep sea is licking my toes with its waves when all of a sudden, pinch. Pinch. PINCH. Judsen is grabbing my nose and giggling to himself. This is a horrible game Josh and Judsen play, where they hold me down and try to pinch my nose, which I HATE. I play along like a good sport, you know, all in the name of family fun, and Judsen has decided that right now would be a great time to give it a go. "Judsen! Please go to sleep! And don't touch my nose!" "Okay." (naughty little giggle) A third time I am almost relaxed, when a bullet shoots through my back. Judsen has stretched himself horizontally across our queen-sized bed and is using my spine as target practice for his high kicks. Needless to say, he got banished from my bed and sent to the guest room.
I would love to say the story ends there, but I was interrupted a fourth time by my little imp sneaking into my room and turning on his toy drill full blast, 6 centimeters from my head. With threats of death, I send him back to the guest room. The fifth and final straw comes when I hear a giant THUMP! Judsen starts crying, as does Felicity. Judsen has pulled something over in his room and has hurt himself and awoken his sister in the process. I believe the phrase that came out of my mouth at this point was something like: "@#$%!! &*#$@!!!"
Since we're all awake now, we decide a little lunch would be in order. This is a good thing, since we have an appointment we need to make it to in just a little while. So, being Efficient Mom, I decide to let the kids eat while I erase the un-sleep from my eyes and put myself together. I put them in their chairs and their lunch on the table, and head towards the bathroom. And then the giggling begins. And goes. And goes. And goes. I know there is way too much laughing going on for them to be eating a single particle, but decide to have a little faith in my kids and finish getting ready, since we are now down to about 15 minutes until we need to leave. I'm almost done when Judsen comes in so covered in milk its practically seeping from his pores. "I'm wet," he says. Yes. I see that. In horror, I imagine what the kitchen must look like for him to be this soggy. I run in there to find Felicity doing her dismount from her high chair (which we've already discussed), but otherwise conditions are not as bad as I feared. I strip Judsen to his undies, instruct him to clean up his mess and go to get Felicity re-dressed, which requires also stripping her, since she is smothered in red velvet cookie, macaroni & cheese, her brother's milk, and several other nameless substances. While I am scrubbing and dressing her, Judsen wanders in and I ask him to get dressed. You know how this part goes. He doesn't. I ask. He doesn't. I finally break down and yell (not my best moment) and he still doesn't. Finally we are two minutes past appointment time and I march him out to the car and strap him in his carseat, stark naked except for those Finding Nemo underpants. "Fine, Judsen. If you won't get dressed, then your friends can just see you naked. Do you want your friends to see you naked?" At first this seems like a novel idea, and he nods. I take my shoe-less but fully clothed daughter and my shoe-less and fully un-clothed son and drive to meet the ladies we are supposed to meet. As I'm driving through the streets with a naked child in the back, I am certain I am going to get pulled over. And how do I explain? (Although, after that morning, I'm sure there's not a man on the planet that would want to tangle with me.) We arrive and I open the car door. Judsen begins to watch his friends pile out of their car and reality finally sets in. Oh, man. My friends. My friends are here. My friends are here and my clothes aren't. My friends really might see me naked. This might be wrong, but after all we had been through, it was somewhat satisfying to see the look that crossed his face as he thought this through. His arms come down over his body to cover himself and he says quietly and somewhat frantically, "I will get dressed now. I am listening." I tried to keep my smile to myself as I helped him get dressed. Score one for Mom.
The good thing about motherhood, though, is that even if your day starts like this one, it doesn't guarantee it will end that way. After a nice visit with our friends, we had a spontaneous picnic. We grabbed $4 worth of food from the Chick-fil-A drive-thru, pulled up in the Michael's parking lot, threw open the back of our van, and enjoyed the beautiful afternoon together. We even visited Michael's in an uncharacteristically uneventful fashion and I found the little candle holders I was looking for. All in all, it was a good day. A memorable day. A day that I will remember a little bit for the grief of the morning, but mostly because I was blessed enough to enjoy a gorgeous day with the sweet spirits I have been given stewardship over. I am a lucky lady.
Thus started my day, the other day, and continued with a muffin-making fest (wherein we open a package that reads "just add milk", dump it in a bowl, have a fight over who gets to stir, slosh the batter into muffin tins, and slide the pan into the oven, in just under 45 minutes! I don't know how on Earth this possibly takes so long, but I have decided that the rule to determine a recipe's actual prep time when cooking with children is: figure out how many kids you have, add to this number each of their ages, then multiply the total by the prep minutes listed in the recipe. And then add 15 minutes for the requisite tastings, food fights, and subsequent time-outs. This is how long it will actually take you to prepare this dish.). So anyway, we made muffins. And then we got dressed (refer to a previous posting on how this goes daily), we listened to Judsen give his hourly animal lecture ("A butterfly is like a stegosaurus." "It is?" "No. It's not. A stegosaurus is a plant-eater. And Tyrannosaurus rex is a meat eater. And he is a predator. And giraffes eat leaves." He impersonates a giraffe eating leaves. "And a great white shark!"), and we once again got after Felicity for standing on top of the table scavenging the remains of her brother's breakfast. (It's not so much the scavenging that bothers me, it's the fact that she will attempt to get herself off the table by stepping into her booster seat, dancing wildly while holding to the top of the seat like she's a trick pony rider, and then sliding herself off the seat backwards letting her legs dangle into the great beyond. If she's lucky, there will be a chair that she can ease herself onto and from there to the floor. More often than not, the chairs are missing because she has pushed them to random locales around the house and she has to flop onto the tile and hope for the best.)
Finally it was nap time, and in my house, that means for all of us, Mom included. Felicity went down like a child with a mother as good as me should :) and being the nice mom I am, I told Judsen he could have a nap in my bed with me. This is a rare treat, and I was feeling generous. After all the events of the morning I was feeling quite tired and was eager for this respite. We laid there quietly for a moment and just as I was slipping into sleep, I hear Judsen begin whispering what sounds like every word he knows. Why the dictionary recitation has to happen right now, I have no idea and quickly ask him to stop. "I'm not saying bad words, Mom. I'm saying 'brains'. 'Brains' isn't a bad word," he reassures me. "Okay, you're right. 'Brains' is not a bad word. But right now it's time to go to sleep." "Okay." Aaaaah. Once again, silence. The sleep sea is licking my toes with its waves when all of a sudden, pinch. Pinch. PINCH. Judsen is grabbing my nose and giggling to himself. This is a horrible game Josh and Judsen play, where they hold me down and try to pinch my nose, which I HATE. I play along like a good sport, you know, all in the name of family fun, and Judsen has decided that right now would be a great time to give it a go. "Judsen! Please go to sleep! And don't touch my nose!" "Okay." (naughty little giggle) A third time I am almost relaxed, when a bullet shoots through my back. Judsen has stretched himself horizontally across our queen-sized bed and is using my spine as target practice for his high kicks. Needless to say, he got banished from my bed and sent to the guest room.
I would love to say the story ends there, but I was interrupted a fourth time by my little imp sneaking into my room and turning on his toy drill full blast, 6 centimeters from my head. With threats of death, I send him back to the guest room. The fifth and final straw comes when I hear a giant THUMP! Judsen starts crying, as does Felicity. Judsen has pulled something over in his room and has hurt himself and awoken his sister in the process. I believe the phrase that came out of my mouth at this point was something like: "@#$%!! &*#$@!!!"
Since we're all awake now, we decide a little lunch would be in order. This is a good thing, since we have an appointment we need to make it to in just a little while. So, being Efficient Mom, I decide to let the kids eat while I erase the un-sleep from my eyes and put myself together. I put them in their chairs and their lunch on the table, and head towards the bathroom. And then the giggling begins. And goes. And goes. And goes. I know there is way too much laughing going on for them to be eating a single particle, but decide to have a little faith in my kids and finish getting ready, since we are now down to about 15 minutes until we need to leave. I'm almost done when Judsen comes in so covered in milk its practically seeping from his pores. "I'm wet," he says. Yes. I see that. In horror, I imagine what the kitchen must look like for him to be this soggy. I run in there to find Felicity doing her dismount from her high chair (which we've already discussed), but otherwise conditions are not as bad as I feared. I strip Judsen to his undies, instruct him to clean up his mess and go to get Felicity re-dressed, which requires also stripping her, since she is smothered in red velvet cookie, macaroni & cheese, her brother's milk, and several other nameless substances. While I am scrubbing and dressing her, Judsen wanders in and I ask him to get dressed. You know how this part goes. He doesn't. I ask. He doesn't. I finally break down and yell (not my best moment) and he still doesn't. Finally we are two minutes past appointment time and I march him out to the car and strap him in his carseat, stark naked except for those Finding Nemo underpants. "Fine, Judsen. If you won't get dressed, then your friends can just see you naked. Do you want your friends to see you naked?" At first this seems like a novel idea, and he nods. I take my shoe-less but fully clothed daughter and my shoe-less and fully un-clothed son and drive to meet the ladies we are supposed to meet. As I'm driving through the streets with a naked child in the back, I am certain I am going to get pulled over. And how do I explain? (Although, after that morning, I'm sure there's not a man on the planet that would want to tangle with me.) We arrive and I open the car door. Judsen begins to watch his friends pile out of their car and reality finally sets in. Oh, man. My friends. My friends are here. My friends are here and my clothes aren't. My friends really might see me naked. This might be wrong, but after all we had been through, it was somewhat satisfying to see the look that crossed his face as he thought this through. His arms come down over his body to cover himself and he says quietly and somewhat frantically, "I will get dressed now. I am listening." I tried to keep my smile to myself as I helped him get dressed. Score one for Mom.
The good thing about motherhood, though, is that even if your day starts like this one, it doesn't guarantee it will end that way. After a nice visit with our friends, we had a spontaneous picnic. We grabbed $4 worth of food from the Chick-fil-A drive-thru, pulled up in the Michael's parking lot, threw open the back of our van, and enjoyed the beautiful afternoon together. We even visited Michael's in an uncharacteristically uneventful fashion and I found the little candle holders I was looking for. All in all, it was a good day. A memorable day. A day that I will remember a little bit for the grief of the morning, but mostly because I was blessed enough to enjoy a gorgeous day with the sweet spirits I have been given stewardship over. I am a lucky lady.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Happy Valentine's Day
So we took a little trip over the weekend to visit Marble Falls, a beautiful little town about four hours from where we live. (Before you start guffawing with remembrance about your own family trips and thinking, "Ha ha! Suckers! They sabotaged their own Valentine's Day weekend with a kids-included hotel stay," let me say this: our kids are pretty good road-trippers. They enjoy adventures and we don't have more than our fair share of Sesame Street DVD marathons, chicken nugget fights, and Houdini-esque attempts to escape from carseat bondage.) We went to Marble Falls to meet a potential business associate, whom we had only spoken to by phone and were eager to meet. We make the drive and arrive at his office looking predictably rumpled and fast food-stained, but still passable. We meet this lovely man and walk into his lovelier office; the doctor, being the gentleman that he is, asks if any of us need to use the bathroom. We accept. (Yes, this is another bathroom story.) As he is pointing me through the lobby to the restroom, Judsen grabs his shorts and announces, "I have to pee." I look down to see the legs of his jeans are soaked. Apparently he's telling the truth. So I smile, grab Judsen's hand, and rush him into the bathroom. Per mine and Josh's decision to not harass Judsen about potty mistakes (described in the previous post), I calmly start to get him cleaned up. While I am doing so, I realize that somehow he has also managed to drench his shirt. "Judsen, is this wet because of pee?" "Yep." (Don't ask me how this happened. You'd think that the laws of physics would prevent bodily fluids, like water in the natural world, from flowing upstream, but clearly, as mothers know, this is never the case.) So I open the bathroom door, return to the lobby, and explain to Josh that I will be running to the car to get Judsen some new clothes. I gather the new outfit, head back into the office and much to my horror, discover a large puddle in the lobby where Judsen had been standing when he announced he had to urinate. At this point, Judsen is still wet and awaiting me in the bathroom, Felicity is upset because I have left the building without her and her own diaper is so soggy it's grazing her knees, Josh and the doc are in the middle of an important discussion that I should really be paying attention to, and now a small tributary of the Thames is running through the doctor's beautiful Texas tile lobby; we have been in the building and in company of the good doctor for less than five minutes. Thankfully (aren't I good for finding something to be thankful for under these circumstances?!) it appeared that Josh and the doc hadn't noticed the urine on the floor. So, I grabbed Felicity and ran for the bathroom, praying that the guys would continue not to notice. We got Judsen dressed and Felicity changed and headed nonchalantly for the lobby. As we arrived, I apologized for the running around and the doctor good-naturedly said it was no big deal, he had three kids and completely understood. The docs go back to their conversation, so moving as discreetly as I can, I bend over and begin to sop up the puddle with an army of baby wipes; of course, Josh decides that this would be a good time for all of us to take a tour of the office and all the attention turns toward me to see if I accept. So I stand up, scoop the baby wipes, hopefully the last of the pee, and my remaining scraps of dignity off the floor, and decide not to say anything further about the incident if they don't. We complete the tour, which consists of the men walking briskly in front, nodding approvingly at things, and me scrambling to keep the kids together and discourage them from picking up numerous unidentifiable, but important-looking metal objects from each of the doctor's operatories (the room in which he works on patients). Judsen (holding up something):"Mom, can I have this? What is it?" Felicity (holding up something else): "Ba!!" (meaning, "Mom, can I have this? What is it?") Me: Gasp. "No! What is that? Where did you even find it?? Please put it down and don't touch anything else." As the tour ends, we adults all sit on comfortable couches to discuss business, and the kids proceed to run back and forth across the lobby, shrieking like Apache warriors. After a patient moment, I try gently explaining to them that I need them to be a bit quieter. This was as successful as if I'd done the same with actual Apache warriors. So finally the kids and I leave the building and leave Josh and the doc to discuss business. As we get outside and the kids run around in the parking lot, I mentally review the last 20 minutes, from the wet-shorts initial meeting to the Red Sea episode to our loud exit from the building, and decide that if this business relationship gets off the ground, it will truly be a miracle.
But, maybe Josh was able to repair the quick and dirty damage we inflicted. We'll see. He's a smooth talker, at least smooth enough to convince me to marry him. I'm glad he talked me into it and that he's been my valentine for the last seven years. Happy Valentine's Day to us and to you.
But, maybe Josh was able to repair the quick and dirty damage we inflicted. We'll see. He's a smooth talker, at least smooth enough to convince me to marry him. I'm glad he talked me into it and that he's been my valentine for the last seven years. Happy Valentine's Day to us and to you.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Okay, here's post number two and stories like these are the whole reason behind this blog. Here's the disclaimer, though. We are at potty training age, so many of our adventures revolve around such. If you're squeamish about such things, don't read on. Go eat a brownie and read Better Homes & Gardens. Now, here goes. After being ill for two weeks, the kids are finally starting to feel better. However, emotions are still delicate and Judsen seems to once again be struggling with potty training. So, in a rare show of mercy, Josh and I have decided to lay off the potty talk with Judsen for a week until he can compose himself and get back on the porcelain horse. So yesterday I knew he had to poo, he knew he had to poo, and poo he did. I didn't say anything, but let him handle it the way he wanted to. Being his small, helpful self, he took off his underwear in the bathroom and proceeded to begin wiping himself. Sounds good, right? I walked in the bathroom to find bile smeared down both of his legs and all over the front of the toilet and a Mt. Everest-sized pile of toilet paper in the pot. Oh man. Swallowing the scream that rose to my throat, I put him in the bathtub and began washing him. Of course this is a disgusting mess and I am trying to get both Judsen and the bathtub clean. While waiting for the dirty water to drain, Felicity decides she can hold off no longer - she needs a bath NOW! So, she swan dives into the bathtub fully clothed, boots, jacket, everything. Of course the kids think this is hilarious, and this time I don't hold back the scream that arises. There are wet clothes, naked children and poop flakes all over the place by this time, so I holler at them to get to the back of the bathtub, don't touch anything until all the water drains out, and if you could refrain from making noise for the rest of your life, that would be great. Eventually, we got the tub clean and all was well, but my goodness.
Getting dressed every morning is no less of an adventure. It's a miracle to me that we ever make it anywhere on time. This morning I find Judsen walking around in just his underwear and the t-shirt he wore to bed. He insists he needs to watch a movie and being the good mom that I am, I tell him we all need to get dressed first. I send him in his room to do this. Of course we have baskets of clean laundry around the house waiting to be folded, so I have to track down a complete outfit for Felicity. While I am doing this, I ask Judsen again to find a shirt and pants. "No Mom, I want to wear this shirt," he tells me, pointing to his sleeping shirt. After a few half-hearted attempts to change his mind, I give in and just ask him to find pants. At this point I have collected a shirt and socks for Felicity and have to run into the other room for the pants she had walked off wearing on her head. While in the other room, I find the pants I have asked Judsen to put on and bring them to him. "Please put these on." "Okay, I will." He doesn't. I eventually track down a diaper for Felicity and begin to dress her, and Judsen begins to stab her with the bike pump and plunger handle he has adopted as his favorite toys. I ask him to please stop. Of course he doesn't. Finally I suggest he get some pants on and then swordfight with some stuffed animals. He considers this such a good suggestion that he doesn't wait for pants, and begins throwing stuffed animals from the closet. He finds what he's looking for and then launches into a lecture of all he knows about these animals, still half naked. "This is a big brown bear! It is 10 feet long!" "Monkeys say, 'Ee-oo-ee-oo'." He then passes out animals to his now-dressed-but-still-raggedy-haired sister. "I'm a big bear and she's a baby bear!" "Judsen! Put your pants on!" I finally take the animals and swords away and shove the waistband of the pants onto his head. Maybe that will distract him from his distractions. He did finally put his pants on, but the episode was apparently so taxing that I find myself still wearing the basketball shorts and dirty long-sleeve T I threw on on my way out of bed so I could make Josh breakfast. Shalisse laughs at how Josh and I dress; Josh is a dentist, but we both dress like we're homeless. Well, considering what it takes just to get 50% of our household decently clothed, can you blame us?
A Little Intro
Hi everyone. I have now officially joined the blogging world, at the request of my mom and mother-in-law who are the biggest cheerleaders for me writing down the wildness that is my journey as a mother. I am married to Josh, who is my best buddy, and we have two beautiful children - Judsen is three and Felicity is 16 months old. They didn't come down as twins, but their spirits are so similar that they might as well have. They both have energy and emotions that are too big for their bodies (and this is really saying something, since both are in the 75th percentile for height and weight for their ages), so I get to enjoy what spills over in the form of tears, sword fights, bodily fluids, giggles, dance parties, and slobbery open-mouthed kisses. I love being a mom, but sometimes can't believe the wild antics these two pull. I reported these stories to my family and both my moms encouraged me to write them down, so here we go ... Enjoy.
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