I Surrender!

It has now officially been more than 24 hours since I had to clean up vomit. I'm almost afraid to write that lest karma come along and bite me in the hiney, but there it is. Every one of our kids was sick but they were all sick indivudally. This is easier on me, I think, but it has to been more fair to them since the sick child gets undivided (sort of) attention instead of being told to "do their best to not puke on anyone else while I clean up this mess over here". Ahem.

Because of this stomach bug and also because it's Thanksgiving week I'm not participating in Menu Plan Monday. But I will keep trying. It truly does save me time and money when I do it. Instead I'll leave you with a link to the best stuffing recipe ever. I made this last year since, apparently, you're not supposed to actually stuff the bird. Who knew? If you make it, just eyeball the amount of broth - I used nowhere near the amount in the recipe.

Our Space Shuttle Is Part School Bus

Not because I haul 2 kids home from school every day. OOOOOH NOOOO! It's because it now has yellow road paint all over the driver's side! Lovely. Stuff like this always happens to me.

I have been driving a lot (obviously) and I don't know exactly where it happened, just that it happened on a day with a boatload of driving involved. Translation: Could have happened anywhere in a 30 mile radius from our house. Yeah.

I drove the vehicle to a PTG (Parent Teacher Group) meeting and one of the other parents informed me that the same thing had happened to her in August. And her husband works for our state's DOT. And this is what he does for a living - paints the lines on the roads. And she filed a claim with the DOT. Oh, the irony! The manufacturer of the paint suggested to slather it with Vaseline and leave it for 48 hours to loosen it. Okaaaay. Sure. Except I can't find the Vaseline. And I am never home for 48 hours straight. Ever.

In the middle of that last paragraph Mr. MOTH came in from the garage. "Honey? Can you come here?" There was something squeaking and scratching in the garage. WE are a couple of WUSSES. We both tried to use the broom to maneuver things around to try to find the source of the noise. Then I got down on all fours and peaked inside a glue trap - one that's supposed to be for spiders. Bingo! A mouse. And my manly, macho, man had to put the little guy out of his misery. {SIGH} Country life. We need a kitty. And I am NOT a cat person.

Back to our regulary scheduled programming...Mr. MOTH asked me to search the interwebs for a "how-to" to remove it. Basically, the internet says, "You're screwed. Big-time. You will forever be driving a highly reflective mini-van." Nice. How much do you think this is going to hurt the trade-in value when it's time to upgrade (in 4 or 5 years)?

Wishes DO Come True!

I've mentioned before that I believe the more specific you are in your prayers, the more likely they are to come true. I did NOT take my own advice and for this trip I simply prayed that it would be healthy, safe, and enjoyable for everyone. For the most part, God provided.
Now that we're back, life itself is in full-swing. This means my blogging time is cut down to a small, small window early in the morning. And after 10 days of no internet? I realized that's OK.

Life in The Mommy's household is now focused on back-to-school (first full day today), a 14-hour round-trip car ride to see my MIL (dread doesn't even begin to describe it...and not for the usual mother-in-law reasons), my brother's wedding (!) - which was announced yesterday and occurs on October 17th (requiring tons of shopping for frilly flower girl dress and fancy suits), and an out-of-town work trip for Mr. MOTH meaning I'll have 100% responsibility for all things childcare and household related for 4 days (including the murder and disposal of any furry/creepy-crawlers - unless I can get my dad to speed over and take care of it for me).

Good thing I just had a vacation :)

Marketing 101

I'll admit it. I was a science geek. A lab rat. So much so that I even made it my profession (until I became a professional mommy). So maybe marketing isn't my strong suit. But seriously folks, this product baffles me!

I saw the commercial last night, and I was all (appropriately) disgusted by the idea that there would be germs on my bottle of soap. Until I realized that touching the bottle as I was about to wash my hands made it kind of unnecessary. I mean, I'm about to wash the germs off of my hands anyways, so what's the difference if I add a few more? I just don't get it...

Random

Baby Girl has some communication issues. I think that this, in large part, contributes to her overall crabbiness (She's unbelievably mean and disrespectful sometimes. We're really working on it. It doesn't help when some people see her general snottiness as "cute". It stopped being cute months ago. But I digress. Ahem.). Today, I offered her a choice of "dessert" after lunch - Hershey's kisses or cake balls that we made for Grandma-Grandma's birthday. She chose kisses. And then her brothers chose the cookies. So she wanted cookies. I explained that she couldn't have both, so she had to choose. She chose cookies..and ate them up. Then promptly asked for her kisses back. I said, "Honey, I told you that you could have one or the other." Baby Girl said, "OK. I'll have 'the other'." {SIGH}

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We stopped to take my mom her above-mentioned cake balls at work today. She's 60. Sixty!! It seems like just yesterday I was planning her surprise 50th birthday party (no easy feat when you have siblings **cough** Erik **cough** who can't keep a secret). Not surprisingly, she looks pretty much exactly the same as she did then, with the possible exception of her hair being shorter. Oh, and she's a grandma to 4 now! Happy Birthday, Mom!

*****
I say "not surprisingly" because we stopped to see my Grandma E (my mom's mom) after that visit and the woman does not look like she just had open-heart surgery a few weeks ago. If she were 60, I wouldn't expect her to look this good afterwards. But she's not 60. She's going to be 90 in November! (Incidentally, I think this is why she looks so young. The day after she turns whatever age - in this case 89 - she starts to say, "I'm going to be 90 soon!" Cracks me up!). Anyhow, that's the update on her. She just had her staples removed (48 of them!) and that went well. She's tired, but that's because she wants to be busy and she has to rest more than she's used to. She doesn't have a lot of patience. I think I know where I get it...

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Tomorrow's Disney story will probably be at least two parts. Possibly three. Let's just say that it was one of those trips where every day you thought that it couldn't possibly get any worse. And then it did. Over and over. The only thing missing was a hurricane. I figure we'll make up for that on this trip...

Open Letter to The Weather Channel

(Alternate Title: Pet Peeve #3,693)

Dear Weather Channel,

I understand your need to compete in a highly commercial world. Really, I do. But must you, too, go the way of MTV? Given your name, I expect to be able to turn to your station and actually see, you know, my forecast. I know, I know. It's crazy to think this way! Afterall, MTV hasn't shown actually Music Television since when? 1994?

You see, Weather Channel People, we were having severe storms in our area on Saturday evening. I was very, very tired (read: very, very cranky) after being at a pool party with our entire family all day. The kids were exhausted. The only thing that I wanted to do was to put them to bed early. And then I heard it. Thunder. If you have small children, you know that you may as well kiss bedtime good-bye if there's going to be a storm. You can blow all the smoke and magic fairy dust out of your butt that you can, and they still ain't gonna believe that God's bowling. Kids are too darn smart!

So, being crazy from exhaustion and all, I stupidly thought that I could put on THE WEATHER CHANNEL and find out what the WEATHER situation was. But, noooooo! Instead, Jim Cantore was telling me all about the frickin' winter wars that go on in International Falls, MN!! Seriously? It's July!! Still, I patiently sat through the v-e-r-y s-l-o-w t-i-c-k-e-r a-t t-h-e b-o-t-t-o-m o-f t-h-e s-c-r-e-e-n. Which, quite frankly, must be written for people who never, done, did gradiate from the 3rd grade!! After seeing our small town, USA, listed as about to be impacted by this line of storms, I waited until "the 8's"...and nothing. So, I waited until the 8's on the hour. Nothing. I finally had to switch to a "local" weather station - one state over and it just cuts off our county. Tornado warnings were popping up everywhere and I was cursing your name!! We survived, with only one set of tears (mine) and a much later bedtime, but it was no thanks to you!!

Oh, and one more thing. Flick and a Forecast? Really?!?! Look, do I turn on HBO and expect to see the local radar? Um, NO! So don't expect me to turn on THE WEATHER CHANNEL in the hopes of seeing a movie!!! Sheesh!

Misc.

There's going to be a lot going on around here in the next couple of weeks. As a matter of fact, there's already a lot going on around here but after Friday I will have all four kids home. All of the time. And I love it. So, I won't be spending a whole lot of time on the computer, unless of course it's to "PRINT, please, Mommy!" I think there will probably be a lot of posts over the next few months that are kind of a jumble of things going on because I'm not going to take the time to make them all that interesting. I also don't want to forget what this time in our lives is like, so I'm still going to blog.

*Last night I watched the Boston Celtics beat the LA Lakers in the NBA finals for the first time since my grandmother passed away in 1993. Not that they haven't played before, just that I couldn't have brought myself to watch it without her. Time does heal, because the whole time I had a shit-eating grin on my face. I remember the glory days of Larry Bird. And it makes me happy.

*We finally moved the girls around. Baby Girl is in a "big girl" room - painted California Lilac, sleeping on a crib mattress on the floor because the child moves around more in her sleep than anyone else I know. More often than not she's sleeping with half of her body on the mattress and half on the blankets I have piled on the floor. The Little One is sleeping in the nursery and we finally took the crib out of our room. When Mr. MOTH asked me this time if I was sure we were done he asked it with trepidation instead of anticipation. We're both ready to move out of the baby stage and into life with children. *whew*

*Little One is officially done with the bottle. Next step? Bye-bye binky!

*Youngest Boy attended his first "kid" party on Friday night and made me the proudest I've ever been. He not only did the right thing but he helped the little heathen who has become his best bud to see the error of his ways and got him to do the right thing as well. *fist pump!*

*I will be having hernia surgery in 10 days. I'm trying not to freak out because it's really "minor" surgery, but I'm a "what if?" kinda girl. I'm trying not to be. But what if?

Does This Day Have a Reset Button?

Did you ever have one of those days? You know, the one where you just really wish you could be someplace - ANYPLACE - else? At least for a few minutes hours days? I can't exactly explain it, but I am not a nice person today. I don't know how to get back to where I AM a nice person, so I'm desperately, intently, insanely looking for the "reset" button that will put me back in bed so that I can A) Actually GET UP when the alarm goes off instead of going back to sleep for 3.5 minutes before the Little One needs to eat. B) Make it through more than 3.5 minutes of the boys being awake before I yell...at BOTH of them. C) Shower without 37 interruptions of "MOMMY!! BROTHER IS STANDING ON THE BED!!" or having to get out of the shower and replace Little One's binky for the umpteenth (what, it's a word, OK?) time. D) Actually START my to-do list before one of the girls falls asleep, because nearly everything that I need to do will wake at least one of them up. E) Actually MAKE a to-do list that CAN be accomplished. F) Sit down for more than 3.5 minutes (without a baby attached to my body) without jumping up and insanely rushing around to get something ANYTHING done. Anybody know where the reset button is? Anybody?!?!

I need a vacation...

Cleaning House

Literally and figuratively, I'm cleaning house. There are quite a few things going on around here these days but none of them really warrant their own post, so I'm just going to throw it all out there.

Baby Girl will turn two-years-old on Friday. Oldest Boy will turn six-years-old on the 14th (that's Valentine's day). We're having a family party for both of them combined on the 7th, which means that the literal part of cleaning should be in full swing. Refer to the following information as to why it's not. I'm also having a kids-only party for Oldest Boy on the 14th. I invited all of the little boys from his class (plus a close friend of the family) which bring our total to 14 boys - not including my two. Yes, I'm insane. The biggest problem with this whole scenario is that everyone is getting presents and cakes and attention...except Youngest Boy. He's already the "middle" child (so far) and now he has to endure being left out for a whole day. Don't worry, I made sure to explain the whole thing to him and we also got him a gift of his own, but I still feel bad, like somehow it's my fault he was born in a different month. OK. I guess it IS my fault, but still.
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The drywall is almost finished in the basement (this is why cleaning cannot be completed. Dude tracks in more mud than my kids. And, oh, the dust). I'm starting to get excited but I'm trying to contain it lest Mr. MOTH think I'm pressuring him into getting it finished NOW! NOW! NOW! I really can't wait. I'm so tired of having a room that looks like a storage shed as the first thing people see when they walk into our home. It's been that way for over a year now. And because it's so close I can almost taste it, I'm starting to get impatient. We are getting ready to start picking out paint colors, though. This will be a HUGE deal. Mr. MOTH is of the "everything should be white" school of thought and I like color. I mean C-O-L-O-R. I want to paint the new bathroom brick red. He almost fell out of his chair laughing until he realized I was serious. I almost have him convinced. I think the rest of the basement is going to be some shade of green, so I'm reconsidering doing the bathroom in hunter, but I haven't decided yet. And Oldest Boy wants to paint the rest of the basement "Black and Gold". I love that kid!
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Baby Girl got a life-like (but not scary life-like) baby doll for Christmas from one of my closest friends. Because the box was labeled for "Ages 3 and up", I wanted to be there to play with it for the first time so that I could understand why (you know, small parts, too much violence, etc.). So, the baby has remained in the box on our living room floor since Christmas. Monday she started pushing the box around yelling, "Baby OUT!" until I finally obliged. Oh.my.God. I wish I knew how to load video onto the computer because it was frickin' amazing. Baby Girl IS my baby, so she's never seen me care for one, but somehow she instinctively KNEW what to do with it! She held her up on her shoulder and patted it. She fed her a bottle (which she took over the the fridge and pretended to "fill" from our water dispenser), she used the spoon to feed her and then wiped her mouth with a cloth. And then. And then. She brought me to tears. I told her it was time for the baby to go to sleep. She laid her down gently on the floor, covered her up, kissed her and said, "Night-night sweet. I love you, sissy. I be right here if you need me." This is what I say to her every night. It made me feel like I'm at least doing something right. {SIGH} I think she'll be just fine as a big sister.