Monday, August 24, 2009

6 Days and Counting

I had an idea to do a countdown to Maya and Eva's twelfth birthday which is coming up - in 6 days. Twelve is freaking me out a little bit and I thought this might help on the acceptance level. I guess in my head I see "twelve" as "SIXTEEN". I know that makes no sense but in my brain it does because ever since I told Tim "in just four years they will be sixteen!" I haven't been able to get it out of my head. I'm adding four to everything. Isaac is really 10 (aacckk!!), I'm really 33 (it was worth a shot). No, actually that makes me almost 46!! OMG I'm freaking myself out. That makes me closer to 50 than 40 and then I really am middle aged. Right now I think that other people think I'm middle aged but I know I'm really not. (It's complicated, but it all works out in my head.)

Where was I? Now that I'm almost 46 it's getting harder to keep my brain cells functioning. Oh yeah, enough about me, so the girls are turning twelve in 6 six day and 16 in 6 days and four years. I think I'll just call it twelveteen. And I'm going to stick with 33.

Thursday, August 20, 2009

College Bound

Somebody needs to let go of the camp songs. And when I say somebody I mean me. Summer is over, it's time to move on.

My nephew (and Godson) went off to college yesterday. He's the oldest grandchild on my side of the family so this a momentous occasion. His mom sent me pictures of them setting him up in his dorm room at Ball State. It all brought a tear to my eye. I would swear on my right eye that it was just a couple of years ago that I was babysitting Sam and buying him loud obnoxious birthday toys that would drive his parents crazy. How did this happen? How did 18 years go by in the blink of an eye?

I look at my kids all the time and wonder how we got here. (Sometimes I wonder why we're here but mostly I wonder how.) With Maya and Eva's 12th birthday approaching I find myself sometimes stopping, thinking and then freaking out. Last night I told Tim that in just 4 short years his daughters will be DRIVING. (That almost killed the mood...) It's at times like this when I have these realizations that I consider not feeding my children. Maybe we could just slow this whole growing up process down a little bit. I won't explain the birds and bees, I'll stop buying them new clothes for a year and we'll go live in the country, on a commune, without... anything.

But then 4 o'clock rolls around on a weekday and my house is impaled with loud children who are really good at doing everything but what they are supposed to be doing and destroying any calm and order or cleanliness that I have gained in the past 7.5 hours.

College here we come.

Monday, August 17, 2009

Wheeeeeeee......

Whewwowwhee!! Or whew-wow-whee. That's a new word I just made up to express my feelings after the first week of school. That means. Whew -I'm glad it's over, wow- that was a long week, and whee- as in wheeeeeee. (It's more of a expelling of my breath after I'd been holding it for a week.)

Before I get into all that I would just like to tell me friend Yoan (notice the extra-anemone, er, anonymity, or anonymousity.) I'm sorry to see you go, but I understand your dilemna. I think it's a smart move Scoan. (That one was Tim's suggestion.) I think it's best if I don't say anything more about leather "scapps" and matching "scests" made out of placemats. Oh yeah, and scogs. I think you know you'll be missed. We scove you - scotally.

I feel like the first week of school could best be described as "the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat." I'm not sure anyone was victorious but It's over and it hurt.

Seventy percent of the week was great. That must have been the 70% when they were actually at school. There was just that small percentage of incidents like Eva coming to the realization that she was in fact going to have to do homework after the second day of school. For some reason being in the sixth grade now I thought she would know this. I'm not sure why I thought that since I'm still telling her to brush her teeth every morning - and night. After about 20 minutes of an emotional breakdown (I'm talking about Eva, mine was much later and a little longer) she got over it and got it done. The next morning as she's heading out to the bus she yells at me "and mom, pray that I don't have any homework!" So I yell back "Eva, YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE HOMEWORK! PRAYING ISN'T GOING TO CHANGE THAT!" She wasn't quite sure how to take that.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Potty Frustrations Part II

So I'm not done with the whole interrupted bathroom time thing. I realized in the shower yesterday (this is where I do all of my best thinking, you'd think I'd be cleaner, or maybe filthy, I don't know) that Tim doesn't have the same problem with finding his private time in the bathroom.

And you know what? Tim will spend 30 minutes or more on the commode with NO INTERRUPTIONS!!! When I realized this I was ready to conduct a study. The "why does the mom always get the short-end of the dirty stick that was scraped off the bottom of someone's shoe with doggie poo poo on it" study. I think you know what I'm saying.

But I don't have to because it was a long shower and I have it figured out. The truth is (and this is very ironic so hold on to your seats) Tim needs no privacy therefore he gets all the alone time he needs when he's meditating on the john. Let me break it down for you.

Tim has always been fine with opening the door and inviting the kids in while he's in his personal library. He doesn't know the meaning of the word modesty. He considers boxers shorts never mind the fact that they are shorts with a big hole in the front where a person's weiner could fall out. I've expressed to him my concern of his johnson junior making an appearance say, at his parents house one morning. But this is a whole other blog topic.

But he has a secret weapon. His shit stinks. (I'm sorry, I try to keep the "potty" words off my blog.) Yes, it stinks bad. So bad that he would invite Isaac in when he was just a toddler and I (yes, me) would have to go in and literally save Isaac because he was GAGGING. No, I'm not making that up. I threatened Tim with charging him with child abuse because it certainly qualified as cruel and unusual punishment.

So the kids steer clear of the bathroom if Tim is in there. And Tim always leaves the door open a crack so we all know who's in there and there might even be a little something wafting through the crack. (Ha, I said crack.)

Now the thought has occured to me that Tim might not appreciate this blog very much but I figure he's had approximately 3650 hours of private reading time and I've had nil. So we're almost even.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Lazy, Hazy Days of Summer

Ok. I'm on a lot of people's $#@! list. I can take it. Just don't tell me I have clown feet. That's low. Also true, but still really low.

I've been a little busy and obviously I've neglected my blog. I think to say I've been psycho, out-of-mind, who's going to come do the laundry?! busy would be more accurate. If I can get the breakfast dishes in the dishwasher the same day we had that breakfast then I'm doing ok. Lately I haven't been doing ok. There have been a few days when I've come home and wondered what breakfast was on the dishes because it was becoming unrecognizable.

But the kids have had a great summer. Ok, an awesome summer if I do say so myself. They have participated in every activity possible that was either free or so cheap I couldn't pass it up. Isaac has particularly enjoyed car camp. That was where he road in the back of the van all summer to Maya and Eva's various activities. I however have developed car lag. That's where after 5 hours of driving to 8 different locations I either need a nap or a smoke. I have a nice napping habit now. I also have a habit of waking up every morning at 4am which makes me wonder if smoking is really that bad for you.

I think we've all gained some insights this summer. The girls are enjoying more sports activities and building a little confidence. Maybe even a little muscle. Isaac is O.C.D. about "working". Actually he's just O.C.D. but this is his big focus now. The boy has to have a job, preferably one that involves either money, writing, telling someone what they are doing wrong or heating up hot pretzels. And really he just generally wants to boss people around. I've had to remind him several times this summer who the boss really is in our house. He looks at me like I'm telling him a bad joke. And I can tell he's just humoring me by not arguing with me. So I'm not really sure who the boss is here but I'm pretending it's me.

And finally I've learned a most insightful lesson. That no matter how old your kids are they still can't leave you alone in the bathroom for five minutes. I have endured 2 months of interrupted potty time before I realized that there was a pattern. How can a person be in a locked bathroom for five minutes and all three of her children NEED to talk to her through the door with the fan running (it's suppose to be a deterrent, I don't really NEED a fan.) twice, each? How is that possible? And are they thinking of questions to ask me with the most possible syllables so that I will either come to the door so that I can hear them or so that I'll just say "yes". "Mooommmmm! Can blu blah bleet-blue-blah with cah-bleh-glah-blue-glah at big-a-boog-bah-blah?"

I've edited my answer from the beginning of summer which was "Hold on a minute, I'll be out in a sec." To "Go Away! Leave me alone." But this last week of summer always sends me over the edge so I'm sure by Sunday I'll be saying "If you knock on that bleeping door one more time I'm going to remove all of your bleeping appendages from your bleeping body and you'll never go blu-blah bleet-blue-blah with cah-bleh-glah-blue-glah again!!"

That seems fair.