The Attack

The mighty hunter carefully chose his weapon.  "Baby Betsy Wetsy will do just fine," he decides with satisfaction.  He goes to the kitchen sink and loads his weapon, a pink plastic bottle.  Then he sneaks out to the living room where his unsuspecting victim is quietly reading books.  

The hunter carefully aims Betsy Wetsy's nether regions at his victim and squeezes the trigger of the bottle with all his might, aiming a mighty stream of water down Betsy-Wetsy's throat and out her bottom.

The victim doesn't even notice until a few minutes later when her back starts to feel damp and cold.  "Wet," she mutters with dissatisfaction.  "Wet," she repeats as she strips off her clothes.  The mighty hunter, while disappointed that his efforts went largely unnoticed, doesn't let it bother him for long and he goes off in pursuit of bigger game(s).

Having Kids Is Finally Starting to Pay Off

I sat around, ate bon-bons and caught up on my soaps while the kids did this:

(And no, I don't really watch soaps.  No comment on the bon-bons.)

Santa Claus Is In Town Early This Year

Santa Claus was in line to get on the bus at the park & ride this morning. Dressed in full gear - beard, red toy sack, black boots, and everything. I knew times were tough, but wow. When Santa's sleigh and reindeer get repo'd and he has to take public transportation...let's just say I don't have a lot of expectations this year for a gift from Santa.

And how long has my website been acting up? I hardly ever go directly to my web address - I usually am logged in from Blogger to post updates - so when I typed in my web address a couple of days ago, I was horrified at the slow loading time. I cleaned up some obsolete html code, and it seems to be working a lot better now. So sorry about that!

The Blue Dress

Natalie has a closetful of beautiful dresses, as most little girls do. Ron, who dresses the kids in the morning and drops them off at daycare, chooses to dress her in practical jeans and tops during the week. So, on the weekends when I choose her clothing, I usually put her in a dress.

Yesterday, I chose a beautiful deep blue velvet dress for her, and as she walked through the living room afterwards, I exclaimed over how beautiful she looked. Sammy, who was sitting on the couch watching TV, hardly glanced up as he commented, "She looks like a big blueberry."

Are boys are just born to say things like that? I think have my work cut out for me, to mold him into a caring, supportive man.

The Potty Chair

We haven't been hitting potty training too hard yet. It's difficult to be consistent with Sammy being at daycare part of the day. My current plan is to tackle potty training for real the week after Christmas, when I'm on vacation.




However. We have been working on getting him on the potty when it's obvious he "assumes the position" (that is, he hides in the corner and gets a look of concentration on his face). Over the weekend, he agreed to sit on his potty, so I set him up with a book and asked if he wanted me to keep him company, or if he wanted privacy. He opted for "pwivacy", so I scooped up the gawking bystander Natalie and closed the door.



Five minutes later, he announced he was done, and I oohed and aahed over the contents of the potty chair, before dumping it in the toilet. We went to his room for a fresh diaper. Afterwards, I stopped by the bathroom to shut off the light, and found this:


And afterwards, she oohed and aahed over the contents of the (empty) potty chair.

I'm thinking that there may be a bright side to the fact that Natalie wants to copy everything her big brother does.

(I apologize for the picture quality - it was taken with my camera phone, which is sadly still the only working camera in our house. Oh, and don't you love our beautiful pink bathroom. Ugh.)

Parenting Poetry

This is why All & Sundry is one of my favorite blogs. I hope you enjoy these poems as much as I did.

I was feeling inspired after reading this post, so I composed one myself.

I know you want milk
I heard you the first
ten times.
Oh, not that cup?
The blue one with
stars on it?

Here’s your milk.
Now you don’t want it?
YES, YOU DO WANT IT?
Here, I’ll set it on
the table while you make up your mind.
Aw, crap.
You’re cleaning that up
yourself.

Taking Advantage of a Combative Mood

We went to a pumpkin patch on Saturday, and the kids had a great time. However, their naps ended up being delayed and then both of them were up much too late. And unlike adults, kids don't sleep later to compensate for lost sleep, so on Sunday, both were in rare form.

When naptime rolled around on Sunday, Sammy was so overtired that he couldn't settle himself down to go to sleep. He'd get out of bed, and I'd pick him up and put him right back. He'd scream, and I'd ignore. Then he'd get up again, and I'd put him back again. On and on, for about half an hour.

Finally, I had an idea. "Fine," I said. "You go play in the living room, and I'm going to take a nap."

"Nooooo!!!!!" he screeched indignantly, as he flung his head down on the pillow. Not too long later, he again started to get up. I repeated, "Fine, go play. I'm going to sleep." Again, "NOOOOOOO!!!!!!" as he plopped back down. Two minutes later? Sound asleep.

That there's reverse psychology at its finest, folks.

Engineer's Guide to Cats

This YouTube video is one of the funniest things I've seen in awhile.

We've all been dealing with a nasty spring cold this past week. Well, it was bad for Ron & I, but the kids seemed to weather it pretty well. I ended up calling in sick to work on Thursday because I had a fever and body aches. Ugh. I am so ready for summer.

Speaking of which, how is it that I went to bed last night on a rainy April evening, and woke up this morning to a windy, cold, snowy November morning? I couldn't believe it when I looked out the window and saw two inches of snow on the ground.

On to the family news. Natalie is pulling up on everything, has started to do the "inchworm crawl", and cut her first tooth this morning. My

baby is disappearing before my eyes, and being replaced by an almost-toddler.

This morning, while I was getting ready in the bathroom, Sammy swooped in and stole my mascara from the counter. I figured his first attempt would be to pull apart the two halves, so I assumed I would have enough time to finish brushing my teeth before he figured out that it needed to be twisted apart. Before the thought even fully formed in my mind, I heard the thwup of the mascara wand being pulled out of the container. I dashed into the hall, and grabbed it away from him before he had a chance to do any damage. Or so I thought, until he turned around.

File in baby book under: "First Black Eye"

He let me clean off the worst of it, but didn't want me to get too close to his eye. So he spent the rest of the day bearing a strange resemblance to Boy George.

We had a little incident this morning, while Ron and Natalie were still sleeping. Sammy helped me tell Ron the story after they got up.

Me: "I was in the bathroom when I heard Sammy get up this morning. He saw the bathroom light was on, so he came in to find me. He came through the door, squinting his eyes against the light, and clutching the two stuffed animals he brought to bed with him last one. One of which, luckily enough, was the Elmo doll who happens to be almost as big as Sammy is."

Sammy: "I fell in the bathtub!"

Me: "He took a wrong turn and ran into the bathtub. The momentum sent him toppling head-first over the rim of the tub."

Sammy: "Animals fall in the bathtub, too!"

Me: "The animals cushioned his fall, so he was startled and frightened, more than hurt. His animals were a little bit damp, though."

Talk about a rude awakening. It's almost as bad as the time someone left the toilet seat up, and I got up in the middle of the night, half-asleep, to use the bathroom and didn't discover that the toilet seat was up until it was too late.

Ever since the kids were old enough to be in any sort of a routine, they have gone to bed around 7:00 p.m. That has always been the light at the end of a long, tunnel-like day, a time that I can look forward to, with no one making any demands on me. So imagine my frustration when, for the past three nights, one or both of the kids has been up until 9:00 p.m. Tonight, everyone was down for the count by 8:00, so that's an improvement. Little Natalie was so tired that she zonked out in the middle of the first bedtime story. I had both kids on my lap, and Natalie started to fuss, so I turned her to her side (her preferred sleeping position). It wasn't ten seconds later when I heard little baby snores coming from her. Sammy was a tougher nut to crack, but after threatening to take his binky away if he didn't stay in his bed, he finally gave up. We were planning on getting rid of the binky this weekend, but there goes that idea. I don't know what I would threaten him with to keep him in his bed otherwise. Funny, because I just recently told someone "We never had that problem with Sammy" - in regards to the whole toddler-not-staying-in-their-bed issue. Famous last words.

I recently read a quote in a parenting magazine, something to the effect of "Your job as the parent of a toddler is to keep them from killing their fool selves." Easier said than done, though. Tonight I was folding laundry, and Sammy pulled out the folding step stool that I keep beside the dryer. He climbed up on it, then tried to use the magnetic appliance bar (which holds a maximum of three pounds) as a foothold to climb up on top of the dryer. You can probably guess what happened next. THUNK, followed by shrieking and wailing. If everyone has a guardian angel, I think toddlers must be provided with fleets (flocks? hosts?) of angels. I also have thought toddlers are a major argument against evolution. By this point in time, humans should have evolved to be immobile until an age when they have a bit of common sense. On the other hand, I've known a few 18-year-olds who don't have a whole lot of common sense, either, so maybe that wouldn't be practical.

I just realized all this seems really negative, but there have been good moments too, in the past few days. Like last night, when the kids were taking a bath, and Sammy was playing with his foam soap. I squeezed out a long, rope-like length of soap, and said, "Oh, there's a snake in the bathtub!" and Sammy, playing along, said, "Who pooped in the bathtub?" His imagination is working overtime these days. He also brought a Scotch tape dispenser over to me a few days ago and said, "This looks like a snail!" and you know, it really does. And then over the weekend, he had some mandarin oranges for lunch and pointed out that one looked like a seahorse.

And even though this has been a trying week, I can't help but think that in another 15 years, the kids will be so busy living their own lives, that they won't have a lot of time for me anymore and I'm going to wish I could re-live these days. This is something that I remind myself of every time that the kids are being high-maintenance or whiny, and it really does help get me through the moment.

So true...sigh

If you have a preschooler, odds are you've read this book. Awhile back, a friend forwarded me this email, written in the same style. All I could think as I read it, was - did this lady hide cameras in my couch cushions?

If you give a mom a muffin, she'll want a cup of coffee to go with it. She'll pour herself some. Her two-year-old will spill the coffee. She'll wipe it up. Wiping the floor, she will find dirty socks. She'll remember she has to do laundry. When she puts the laundry in the washer, she'll trip over boots and bump into the freezer. Bumping into the freezer will remind her she has to plan supper. She will get out a pound of hamburger. She'll look for her cookbook. (101 Things To Make With A Pound Of Hamburger.) The cookbook is sitting under a pile of mail. She will see the phone bill, which is due tomorrow. She will look for her checkbook. The checkbook is in her purse that is being dumped out by her two-year-old. She'll smell something funny. She'll change the two-year-old. While she is changing the two-year-old the phone will ring. Her five-year-old will answer and hang up. She'll remember that she wants to phone a friend to come for coffee. Thinking of coffee will remind her that she was going to have a cup. She will pour herself some. And chances are, if she has a cup of coffee, her kids will have eaten the muffin that went with it.

by Kathy Fictorie, based on "If you Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff

A rose by any other name...

This morning, the kids were up bright and early, as usual. This, coupled with the fact that I didn't get to bed until midnight last night, and Natalie was waking up to eat all night long, made for a very short night.

At some point during the morning, the kids and I were in my bedroom. I was changing my alarm clock forward an hour, and Sammy said, "What are you doing, Mommy?" and I said, "I'm being tired and crabby." Sammy said, "I look at 'tired and crabby', too" and picked up the alarm clock. I didn't bother correcting him. Tomato, to-mah-to, and all that.

We went out to eat for my birthday on Sunday. This is huge, because we haven’t ever taken both kids out to a restaurant. It was challenging enough when it was just Sammy.

We chose an all-you-can-eat buffet. Not the most exciting place I could have chosen, but there was a method to my madness. With really little kids, it’s all about getting in and out as quickly as you can, before anyone gets bored or melts down. So you see, a buffet totally eliminates all of the wait-to-order and wait-for-your-food time.

Before we went inside, we went over expectations with Sammy. I told him about restaurant manners, and how we all need to stay sitting at the table until everyone is finished eating. Spelling things out for him makes such a huge difference. We did have to remind him of his restaurant manners a couple of times while we were eating, but he did really well overall. I was so proud of him! He right away made small talk with the people at the surrounding tables. “This is chicken,” he said to the gentleman on his right. “That’s Nye,” he informed the people on our left. There are no strangers to him – just friends he hasn’t met yet. I don’t know where that social butterfly gene comes from. Certainly not from his dad or me.

This morning as I was putting on my earrings, Sammy watched me and then said, “Putting on your ornaments, Mommy?” Out of the mouths of babes.

I'm fighting off a little cold. Not too surprising, since both of the kids have had runny noses for the past two months. This is what it's come to - my life consists of wiping noses and butts.

To try and fend off the cold, I've been taking Zicam. It's these meltaway pills that come in a little tube with a non-childproof lid. This morning, I took one and put the tube back in my purse. Sammy went over to the purse, pulled out the tube and took the cap off. I told him that he couldn't play with those and took the tube back from him. He stood there, looking at me, and finally said, "I'm mad". I've never heard him say that before, so I was going through my mental Sammy-English dictionary to think what other word that could be. While I was thinking, he said again, "I'm mad...at you." No question about it that time.

It was funny this morning, but ask me again when he's a teenager.

Natalie is sitting up pretty well these days, but she still does a lot of over-correcting. As long as she doesn’t get hurt, it’s pretty hilarious.

Over the weekend, I had her sitting on Sammy’s bed while I was putting clothes away. She and Sammy were both sitting there, looking at a book together. Well, mostly Sammy was looking at the book, and every time Natalie would try to touch it, Sammy would say, “No touch, Nye. My book.” and yank it away from her. But at least they were both occupied and no one was crying.

I turned around to see Natalie hanging headfirst off the bed. I lunged and grabbed her in time before the rest of her slid off. I had set her well away from the edge of the bed, but I always underestimate how long she is. She didn’t even seem to realize what had happened, so all was well.

That reminded me of something that happened when Sammy was around the same age. I set him on the floor in the hall outside the bathroom, and Anya came running over. That poor cat never did figure out that she was more likely to get her fur pulled by him than petted.

First, I need to explain the “fall-down” trick. Both of our cats were very good at this trick. It was one of the only two tricks in their repertoire – the other one being the “lie on the newspaper to get your human’s attention” trick. The fall-down trick involved me patting the floor, and the cat coming over and flopping down on top of my hand.

Sammy must have done something with his hand that reminded Anya of this trick. She put her head down on Sammy’s hand, and executed her trick flawlessly. Sammy went butt-over-teakettle backwards, cat on top of him.

I rushed into the hall, laughing so hard I couldn’t hardly catch a breath, and removed the cat so she wouldn’t end up clawing him as she tried to get off.

I wasn’t finished in the bathroom yet, so after sitting Sammy back up in the hall, I went back to the bathroom.

Along came Anya for round two. She sauntered past Sammy, twitching her tail in invitation – come on, you know you want to pet me was what she was thinking. Sammy was thinking, I wonder what will happen if I pull this? He reached out and grabbed her tail, and she tried to take off running. That was enough to yank Sammy out of his precarious sitting position, and he landed squarely on top of Anya. They called it even and went on to other pursuits.

Mother's little helper

Sammy loves to help out with his little sister.

Here, Natalie was fussing so Sammy brought her a few toys to play with. This picture was taken early on - by the time he was done, you couldn't hardly see her face behind the mound of stuffed animals. That white fuzzy thing is actually one of my cat slippers that Sammy dug out from the closet.

Here, he was "holding da baby".

And here he was "pumpa milk for da baby". He couldn't figure out why no milk was coming out.

Ron says that I'm overreacting to the whole near-electrocution incident. He claims that he stuck something in an outlet as a child, and although "it's something you only do once", he lived to tell the story. Hmm, you know...that might explain that weird glow. And that zzzztt sound whenever a mosquito lands on him.


I'm not too sure I trust him when it comes to matters electric, though. You see, a few years ago, I decided to put a garden in the back yard. There's a shed in the back, and the previous owners ran an underground electrical wire from the garage to the shed. At some point, Ron chopped the wire off where it ran into the shed. Since he was able to do that without incident, and the fact that the frayed end had been exposed to the elements for years, he was convinced there was no power in that line. Like a lamb to the slaughter the trusting wife that I am, I started tilling. When I was a few feet away from the shed, I felt a jolt. Hmm, I thought, I must have hit a rock. I picked up the tiller and moved it a few inches, thinking I'd be clear of the rock. Another jolt, stronger than the first. Wow, that must be a really big rock, I thought. I picked up the tiller again, and moved it a couple of feet away. ZZZTTTT!!!! That's when I finally realized that I was getting shocked. That and the fact that I could smell scorched hair (kidding about that part, of course).

I guess getting shocked is not necessarily "something you only do once". At least not if you're me.

In the beginning

Okay, so this is my third attempt at keeping a blog. I never can quite seem to stick with it, so hopefully the third time's a charm!

I took the bus to work for the first four years I worked downtown, but when I was 8 months pregnant with Sammy, I started driving. You'd think other bus riders would take pity on a hugely pregnant woman and offer her a seat, wouldn't you? Not so much. I am not one to ask for special treatment, but taking a 45-minute bus ride standing up, while going down the freeway, is nothing short of dangerous when you can no longer even remember that you ever had a center of balance. And trust me - there was no mistaking the fact that I was pregnant. I have a short torso, so there is nowhere for my babies to go but out. I think the only question was exactly how many babies were in there.

Then, after Sammy was born, I kept driving because of work & daycare schedules, blah blah blah. Now we have a new arrangement, with just enough of a shift in my hours that there's now a mid-day bus that will take me home again. So I decided to go back to busing. Besides the positive impact on the environment, I am thrilled that I will no longer be spending so much money on gas, plus I have an extra hour and a half in my day to read!

This week, I started taking the bus again. Since the 35W bridge collapse, my bus has taken a detour, so this was the first time I was riding the new route. The morning commute was fine. Fast forward to the afternoon commute. I was standing at what I thought was the bus stop, and I looked down at my watch to see what time it is. Hmm, I thought, I could have sworn the bus was supposed to be here 2 minutes ago. I pulled out my cell phone and dialed the bus line. After two minutes of maneuvering my way through the automated system, I found out the bus was supposed to be coming RIGHT NOW, BUT 2 BLOCKS AWAY FROM WHERE I WAS CURRENTLY STANDING. Uh-oh. I run down the icy sidewalk and get to the intersection just as the bus is going through. Keep in mind, there is not another bus for 2 hours, and it would take me about 2 days to walk home from where I am. So I run the next block, in my high heels, with my breastpump, my briefcase, and my purse merrily swinging away beside me. Thank goodness the bus drive saw me running for the bus, and he stopped mid-block to let me on. I was so thankful - however, we have had a LOT of snow lately, and the snowback separating the bus and me was about 2 feet high. Remember that I'm wearing high heels? OK, good. So I get halfway through the snowbank and lose one of my shoes. I turn around, balancing on one leg like a flustered flamingo, grab my shoe out of the snowbank, and board the bus with one shoe in my hand. I didn't look up to take count of how many of the passengers were laughing at me.

So that was my first day riding the bus. Thankfully yesterday was better.