Family Circus

The other night the sitter was here, and Charles was watching a t.v. show. The sitter said, "Charles, I'll give you 5 more minutes." The sitter felt rather generous, since already he was getting to watch tv, which is not generally allowed, and then it was past his bedtime, plus the additional five minutes.

Charles turned to the sitter in disgust and said, " Five minutes! I can get more than that on Ebay."

This afternoon I got home from running errands and taking Oliver to gymnastics, and quite frankly, was totally and completely sick of my offspring. As in, I couldn't stand being around them. So I unloaded the groceries, got everyone out of the car, and then went and hid in the front yard sitting on the curb. For awhile the kids couldn't find me. They were playing in the backyard, or upstairs fighting with each other under the guise of doing homework.

Oliver found me first. He settled in next to me at the curb and looked at the advertisement from the mailbox next to us. "Mommy" (technically, I do not allow the children to call me mommy, though I've noticed to my horror that on occasion I refer to myself as mommy when speaking to the younger half, and Oliver calls me this on occasion when we are alone and he is feeling calm and thoughtful) "Mommy, when I grow up I'm going to move out and buy a bed just like that one," he said, pointing to the advertisement. "How many dollars is it? Do you think I can afford it?"

I didn't really answer the question. He then began investing his legs and feet. He is always, ALWAYS, barefoot. I now keep a pair of Walmart crocs in the car for the purpose of having something on his feet when we go into stores, etc. He studied his foot for a few moments. It has a couple scabs, scratches and gouges. He began tapping at it. "Mom, I think my foot has a broken leg, because it hurts."

Charles' Birthday Present

I decided to get Charles a parakeet for his birthday. To be perfectly honest, I've wanted a little bird my whole life. I love listening to the birds in the mornings when I wake up, and will hold off turning on the air conditioning for weeks after it gets hot, just so I wake up with the windows open. It drives Jon nuts.

Today was Charles' last day of school, and thus my last morning without Charles. I cleaned up the cage I bought used off of Craigslist, and prepared it for Fuzzuls arrival--that being the pre-chosen name of the bird, which Charles is of course, free to change once he receives the bird.

We are celebrating Charles' birthday on Sunday, so until then, fuzzuls is staying in my bathroom; more specifically, in our jacuzzi tub, on a stand, in his cage. I bought him this morning, and boy was he frightened and upset. I settled him into his cage, and we ignored him for a couple hours. I've gone up periodically to talk to fuzzuls and hold him, saying, "Step Up" when I want him to step up to my hand and "Step down" when I want him to go back to his stand. He is quite wild, having little human contact, if any, before today.

Fuzzuls is making tremendous progress. Already he perches nicely on my hand, and will eat from my other hand. He also gives me kisses on my nose. I might be too attached by Sunday to surrender Fuzzuls to Charles.

I had banned all the children from mentioning even a word about Charles birthday present. When I picked him up from school, on our way back to the car, I spotted a lizard and helped Charles catch the lizard. I had hoped that it would distract Oliver from mentioning Fuzzuls. The moment I was backing out of the driveway, Oliver bursts out with," Don't worry, Charles. I'm not going to tell you your birthday present. It's a surprise. It isn't a bird."

I immediately said, "Oliver, not another word," to which he responded, " I didn't tell him we got him a bird."

Charles clearly knows he's getting a bird, or will probably get a bird. But he doesn't know it's already here living in my bathroom. So maybe there'll still be some surprise.

Rum Cake

I'm baking six rum cakes today. Three are in the oven now. Ingredient list:

3 lbs sourcream
3 lbs mini chocolate chips
6 boxes yellow cake mix
6 lg boxes instant chocolate pudding
2 dozen eggs
1 qt. canola oil
1 1/2 lbs butter
a whole lot of rum.

Yummy!

Cool Mom

The other day Charles was bug hunting in the backyard, and I came out to jump on the trampoline for a few minutes. It helps to jump for 5 minutes when I've been sitting at my desk for hours working on prolife stuff and Caroline's school work, which is reason enough to cause vast quantities of pent up frustrations.

I was going through my routine, bounding happily away, and then I did a couple flips. I didn't notice that Charles had ceased hunting and was just watching me. Finally, on my last flip, I landed just right, on my feet, and kept bouncing. Charles came running over.

"Mom, you're just like a rock star! You are the coolest mom ever!"

I guess dragging my kids to the Capitol and abortion mills isn't entirely ruining my reputation. Especially if I can do flips on my trampoline and land on my feet.

So much for my potty training prowess.

I despise toilet training. DESPISE. And I've never actually toilet trained anyone, though I've made a few attempts. It all ends up being a matter of the power of the bribe. When I light upon the magical bribe, voila! The beautiful happens.

Jonathan was bribed with a package of big boy Buzz Lightyear underwear. Caroline had her ears pierced. Charles.....not currently remembering, but it isn't vital to this current story. Oliver...took me awhile to find what caused the magic, but live crickets from Pet Smart was the lucky charm. Everyday he kept his pants dry, he got three crickets. Gabriel......still searching.

I had decided last week to use a method that was somewhat successful with Oliver on Gabriel: having the kid go without underwear. That's right. Except for a shirt, essentially naked. Oliver would make it to the toilet, but as soon as you put pants on him he was back to wetting them (until crickets became rewards).

I had put regular pants on Gabriel, which he proceeded to wet one set after another all day. Frustrated, I decided to remove everything. At first he was upset to be without his clothes unlike Oliver who had been thoroughly joyful at not having to wear pants. He'd likely join a nudist colony if he knew such a thing existed.

Within 10 minutes Gabriel had acclimated to life without pants, and was running around the upstairs with his siblings. Suddenly, Gabriel came down rubbing his eyes and attempting to cry, but not being quite successful. "What's the matter?" I asked, a little worried. "Did you pee on something?"

"No," Gabriel quickly responded. I was relieved. "Well, then what's your problem?" I asked going back to my dinner preparations. He didn't say anything, just continued the eye rubbing and fake crying. Oliver was bounding down the stairs. "He pooped on the stairs, mom!" He announced clearly thrilled to be the bearer of bad news. "What? What do you mean?" I was incredulous. His bottom looked clean enough.

I looked at Gabriel and he nodded his assent to Oliver's story, moving his fists a little away from his eyes to observe my response. I raced for the stairs, and there, yes, there on the stair was a perfect cow pie in miniature. How the kid managed to squat and get that out leaving his bottom relatively clean in the process, I will never know. The fact that he decided the stairs was a good spot to deliver the goods is hard for my mind to get around.

Fortunately, the little cow pie cleaned up quite nicely. Like one of those stiff dog turds you might find on the floor where it lifts off without a stain or residue, but you clean the daylights out that foot square area because of the very idea.

However, the pants off potty training method is clearly not an option for my 5th born. Until another idea presents itself, we are back in diapers. Still two in diapers. Sigh.

life in general

I've had a number of funny stories in my brain, but now that I've sat down to type them out, they are not currently accessible. I can't really remember even one.

Oliver started gymnastics today. I must say that watching a gymnastics class is highly, highly entertaining. I would recommend that all parents skip basketball, soccer, baseball (especially baseball), ballet, tap dance, or any other activity and just go with gymnastics. Here's why. There is only one massive room--kind of on the scale of a smallish football field--and the entire floor is covered in matting, trampolines, balancing beams, volts, spring boards, parallel bars, and other sundry items associated with the art of gymnastics. All classes train simultaneously. One kid is running at top speed one way toward a spring board, vault and flip, etc, while another kid goes in the opposite direction to perform the same. They almost seem like they'll collide.

The little tikes are going through rounds on balancing beams, another group is on the trampoline, the boys are on the parallel bars. This is one highly entertaining hour. I do believe I could sit there all day, in a rather comatose glazed over state, and be entertained. The best part is that the noise is so great that it is impossible to make phone calls.

Oliver LOVED it. He told me it was better than catching lizards, and we all know how high lizard catching ranks on the list of joys for Jollie Ollie. I signed him up for one hour classes every Wednesday and Friday. I figure since he has swim on Tuesday and Thursday, he'll be a more tired chap in general, and thus more pleasant to be around. Oliver is like a puppy. A tired Ollie is an obedient Ollie.

I just remembered a funny story. The other day Oliver and Gabriel were doing something together and Oliver said, "When I grow up, I'm going to say bad words." The babysitter was standing there and asked, "What kind of bad words are you going to say?" Oliver paused for a moment, hesitant to indulge, but then proceeded," I'm gonna say darn it (but it came out dawn it with a real southern twang)". Gabriel looked at Oliver in horror.

"Do not say that!" He objected. Oliver grinned. "Dawn it," he said again, and then, "Dawn it, dawn it, dawn it." Gabriel puffed up in indignation and said," If you don't stop saying that, I'm going to kick you in the butt."

When the story was repeated to Jon and me we were rather proud of Gabriel, that he stood up to his brother, though Oliver pounds him regularly.

I wonder if Oliver will be a little disappointed when he grows up and realizes saying bad words isn't quite as fulfilling as he anticipates.