Ok, so today was my first day back at work after a lovely summer off. For those of you who are unaware, I teach pre-school to 60 3 and 4 year olds. As horrifying as this might sound, it is actually a ton of fun. Every day is like an episode of "Kids say the Darnedest things". But, because of the overwhelming brain power it takes for me to make it through the first day of school (remember, I have to learn ALL of their names, 60 kids, and I can barley remember my own 3) I have no energy left for a funny story this evening. However, I have a few random thoughts I would like to put out there for you all to ponder. Enjoy...
Why is it that no matter how much water my children use when brushing their teeth, they ALWAYS leave toothpaste in the sink?
How is it that my husband can always rile the girls up to the point of crazy, and then mysteriously disappear just before their bedtime?
Am I really the only person in my house that can correctly identify an empty toilet paper roll?
No, the laundry does NOT do itself.
That big machine under the counter, next to the sink, turns out the dishes have to go into it in order to get clean. The cleaning does not happen by metamorphosis from the counter, I know it's shocking.
Is it wrong that I can quote "High School Musical "1 and 2 verbatim? Or worse, that I agree with the girls and think Zac Efron is dreamy?
For some reason, the bath mat insists on jumping back off the side of the tub after anyone in the house uses it. I am the only one who can make it stay, weird.
Same goes for bath towels, towel racks are tricky little devils.
No one ever wants to talk to me, unless I am watching TV. Thank you Lord for Digital cable.
Now I must go, tuck the girls into bed for the 17th time. Hence the comment about Tom riling them up, Dad strikes again! But don't judge him too harshly, he is currently online saving the world with his brother, one video game at a time.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Squirrel or Gopher (this one's for you Chloe!)
For anyone that has been reading my comments, you will notice several pertaining to how "not funny" I am. These were posted by my loving, oldest daughter Chloe. Apparently she is a little ticked that I have not dedicated a story to her. I tried to explain that it isn't because I don't love her as much, it's because she isn't nearly as crazy as her sisters. But in the spirit of fairness and keeping my oldest happy, I have decided to revisit one of my favorite Summer memories: The Gopher.
It all started on a lovely summer evening. I was sitting inside relaxing (probably folding laundry because it's hard for me to sit and do nothing) and the girls were all playing peacefully in the backyard. I could hear the girls coming in and out of the house and garage, but they always do that, so I really didn't give it a second thought. Until Emma came in. She says, "Mom, I wasn't going to say anything, but I thought you should know that Chloe is trying to fix a hurt squirrel." WHAT?! I jump off the couch and run down the deck stairs to see Chloe aka: the animal whisperer, with a towel, a hose, a cat carrier and the poop scooper, standing over some half-dead creature. This is not an exaggeration, I have taken no creative licence with this, it really happened.
Anyhow, Chloe has moved the creature,(at this point, I was not sure what it was), onto a towel, yes a "good" towel, using the poop scooper, which, in looking back was rather ingenious, and she has hosed it off. Apparently it had some open wounds, enough said. So I am looking at a wet, half-dead creature, that the girls have identified as a squirrel, laying on one of my good towels. I can honestly say, I had NO idea what to do. Tom was in California, and I can tell the animal isn't long for this world, but I REALLY didn't want to be the one to finish it off, so to speak.
Meanwhile, the girls are alternately crying and blaming our dog, Stella for this injustice. Now, I am the first to admit that Stella has a bit of a weight problem. She will eat anything. The biggest problem in the "Stella ate the squirrel" theory is that Stella can't move that fast. There is no way that Stella could catch a squirrel. She can barley walk across our living room without needing to rest. As I stand there looking at this thing, I realize it is NOT a squirrel at all, it is a gopher. Not that this realization made much difference in the big picture, but I felt it was really important to be able to identify the correct species of animal dying in my back yard. So I tell the girls it's a gopher, and they explain, as only my kids can, that they are sure it is a squirrel. When I point out the obvious fact that it doesn't have tail, much less a big bushy squirrel tail, I am informed that they have already covered this, and clearly the tail was eaten by whatever attacked this gopher/squirrel. OK, fine, clearly a long winded debate about what kind of animal this is doesn't really solve anything, so I let it go, knowing I am right and it's a gopher, and move on to the next problem. What the heck do I do with it?
Oh, I failed to mention that upon arriving on the scene, I immediately sent the girls into the house to wash their hands, repeatedly. I recommended scalding hot water and any antibacterial anything they could find, followed up with a nice bleach rinse. (I am just kidding, I only thought about the bleach, I didn't really have them use it)
So back to the furry body in the back yard. At this point everyone was full of good ideas. Chloe thought we should load it into the cat carrier and take it to vet, Lili thought I should get our neighbor, and Emma thought I should call my friend that lives down the street who is a labor/delivery nurse, surley she can save it. I am pretty sure this was NOT her area of expertise. So I go with Lili's idea, go get Tom, the neighbor. Of course he isn't home. That would have been too easy. Plan B: Get my friend, the nurses husband to come help. So we all trek down the street to ask for help, now just to clarify, had the gopher been all the way dead, I could have managed to get it to the trash can, probably. But seeing as this thing still had a little life left in it, I could not bring myself to put it in the trash can. Besides the fact that I would have felt horribly guilty for not giving it a chance to live, I was afraid it would manage to miraculously heal itself and attack me the next time I opened the trash can lid. Irrational maybe, but this is me we are dealing with. So we go to ask Mike the neighbor for help, but he was not available right then, so I tell his daughter to have him come down when he can. Somehow this turned into an "emergency" at our house and the next thing I know, Mike is in my backyard, ready for a horrible disaster. Needless to say, a half dead gopher didn't qualify. The good news was,(at least for me it was good news, in hind sight the gopher was probably not too happy) by the time we got back to our yard, the little creature had passed onto a better place, (it had died), so all Mike had to do was confirm that it was indeed a gopher, (I still felt the need to be right), and dispose of the body. He was very nice, even asking me if I would like the towel back. Um, no thanks. There isn't enough detergent and bleach in the whole world for me to ever use that towel again.
I then spend the next hour or so consoling my grieving daughters, who have by now bonded with their new best friend, the gopher, and dealing with the continuing resentment and blame directed towards poor Stella. Luckily, we all made it through this harrowing experience and I think we did our friends at Animal Planet proud. Maybe we should start "Animal Cops, Twin Falls."
It all started on a lovely summer evening. I was sitting inside relaxing (probably folding laundry because it's hard for me to sit and do nothing) and the girls were all playing peacefully in the backyard. I could hear the girls coming in and out of the house and garage, but they always do that, so I really didn't give it a second thought. Until Emma came in. She says, "Mom, I wasn't going to say anything, but I thought you should know that Chloe is trying to fix a hurt squirrel." WHAT?! I jump off the couch and run down the deck stairs to see Chloe aka: the animal whisperer, with a towel, a hose, a cat carrier and the poop scooper, standing over some half-dead creature. This is not an exaggeration, I have taken no creative licence with this, it really happened.
Anyhow, Chloe has moved the creature,(at this point, I was not sure what it was), onto a towel, yes a "good" towel, using the poop scooper, which, in looking back was rather ingenious, and she has hosed it off. Apparently it had some open wounds, enough said. So I am looking at a wet, half-dead creature, that the girls have identified as a squirrel, laying on one of my good towels. I can honestly say, I had NO idea what to do. Tom was in California, and I can tell the animal isn't long for this world, but I REALLY didn't want to be the one to finish it off, so to speak.
Meanwhile, the girls are alternately crying and blaming our dog, Stella for this injustice. Now, I am the first to admit that Stella has a bit of a weight problem. She will eat anything. The biggest problem in the "Stella ate the squirrel" theory is that Stella can't move that fast. There is no way that Stella could catch a squirrel. She can barley walk across our living room without needing to rest. As I stand there looking at this thing, I realize it is NOT a squirrel at all, it is a gopher. Not that this realization made much difference in the big picture, but I felt it was really important to be able to identify the correct species of animal dying in my back yard. So I tell the girls it's a gopher, and they explain, as only my kids can, that they are sure it is a squirrel. When I point out the obvious fact that it doesn't have tail, much less a big bushy squirrel tail, I am informed that they have already covered this, and clearly the tail was eaten by whatever attacked this gopher/squirrel. OK, fine, clearly a long winded debate about what kind of animal this is doesn't really solve anything, so I let it go, knowing I am right and it's a gopher, and move on to the next problem. What the heck do I do with it?
Oh, I failed to mention that upon arriving on the scene, I immediately sent the girls into the house to wash their hands, repeatedly. I recommended scalding hot water and any antibacterial anything they could find, followed up with a nice bleach rinse. (I am just kidding, I only thought about the bleach, I didn't really have them use it)
So back to the furry body in the back yard. At this point everyone was full of good ideas. Chloe thought we should load it into the cat carrier and take it to vet, Lili thought I should get our neighbor, and Emma thought I should call my friend that lives down the street who is a labor/delivery nurse, surley she can save it. I am pretty sure this was NOT her area of expertise. So I go with Lili's idea, go get Tom, the neighbor. Of course he isn't home. That would have been too easy. Plan B: Get my friend, the nurses husband to come help. So we all trek down the street to ask for help, now just to clarify, had the gopher been all the way dead, I could have managed to get it to the trash can, probably. But seeing as this thing still had a little life left in it, I could not bring myself to put it in the trash can. Besides the fact that I would have felt horribly guilty for not giving it a chance to live, I was afraid it would manage to miraculously heal itself and attack me the next time I opened the trash can lid. Irrational maybe, but this is me we are dealing with. So we go to ask Mike the neighbor for help, but he was not available right then, so I tell his daughter to have him come down when he can. Somehow this turned into an "emergency" at our house and the next thing I know, Mike is in my backyard, ready for a horrible disaster. Needless to say, a half dead gopher didn't qualify. The good news was,(at least for me it was good news, in hind sight the gopher was probably not too happy) by the time we got back to our yard, the little creature had passed onto a better place, (it had died), so all Mike had to do was confirm that it was indeed a gopher, (I still felt the need to be right), and dispose of the body. He was very nice, even asking me if I would like the towel back. Um, no thanks. There isn't enough detergent and bleach in the whole world for me to ever use that towel again.
I then spend the next hour or so consoling my grieving daughters, who have by now bonded with their new best friend, the gopher, and dealing with the continuing resentment and blame directed towards poor Stella. Luckily, we all made it through this harrowing experience and I think we did our friends at Animal Planet proud. Maybe we should start "Animal Cops, Twin Falls."
Friday, September 7, 2007
When isn't a Pink Tutu appropriate?
Here's the thing, I am starting to realize I may have allowed Lili a smidgen too much freedom in her everyday choices. I have never been particularly strict about clothes, shoes and hair. My thought has always been "As long as they are dressed and their hair was brushed at some point in the last 24 hours, I am doing great!" Chloe and Emma both understood that they can make these choices, and most of the time, I am okay with them. As they have gotten older, they have been very responsible, sometimes brushing their hair twice in a 24 hour period, and almost always wearing matching outfits. Actually, to Emma's credit, she brushes her hair more than any child I have ever seen. She takes the "Marsha Brady" approach to hair care, I often catch her counting, "87, 88, 89..." Yep, all the way up to 100. But I regress, back to Lili...As I have mentioned before, she is definitely the most free-spirited of all my girls, and as we were getting ready to take Emma to a doctors appointment yesterday, I started to think that perhaps I need to reign her in...
It all started with Lili wanting curly hair, now for those of you who don't know, Lili has the straightest hair ever. So she found the sponge rollers, let me put them in and slept in them. Great, now she looks like Shirley Temple, Step one complete. Step two: What to wear? A Tutu, of course. After a lengthy conversation about the appropriateness(or lack there of) of wearing a see through skirt to the doctors office, Lili figured it out. She needed the WHOLE outfit, leotard and all. Not just any leotard, the pink and purple sparkly one with the HUGE pink tutu, perfect!
Sparkly pink shoes are just the finishing touch this ensemble needs, now we can go. Luckily we have to go to school to pick Emma up a little early. That means there are 700 potential sets of eyes that can see Lili in all her pink tutu glory! Yeah for us! After making it down the hall with only a handful of curious glances, we make it to Emma's class room just in time for all the kids, in the whole school, to come in from recess. Great.
Here's the interesting part; no one seems particularly surprised to see Lili in this outfit. Hmmm.
Off we go, me, Emma and Miss Tutu herself. We are stopped by a group of teachers along the way and one of them says, "I always love to see what Lili will be wearing" (Fabulous, she's notorious) another teacher asked "oh, is she on her way to dance?" a very logical question considering the outfit. I respond, "Nope, we're on our way to the doctor". I can see their minds working, hoping against hope that we are going to see the psychologist, little do they know the appointment isn't even for me or Lili.
We make it to the doctors office with only a few curious glances from passengers in other cars, but this could be from the fact that we have all of the windows down and the "High School Musical 2" soundtrack blaring while we all, yes, even me, sing along at the top of our lungs. After a painfully long wait, we get to see the doctor, who tells Lili she looks lovely and is so glad she dressed up to come see her. No look of horror that I could possibly let her leave the house in that, no condescending glance implying I am the worst Mom ever, just a simple compliment to my funny, independent, outgoing 4 year old. And I realize, this lady is a Doctor, she had to go to school for a LONG time, she's really smart, and she doesn't think I 'm a bad mom. In fact, I think she approves of my parenting. I am so pleased I can hardly think straight. In fact, I feel so good about this whole tutu thing, I may wear one the next time I have an appointment,...then again, probably not. (By the way, Emma is fine, at least as "fine" as she can be with me as her Mom)
It all started with Lili wanting curly hair, now for those of you who don't know, Lili has the straightest hair ever. So she found the sponge rollers, let me put them in and slept in them. Great, now she looks like Shirley Temple, Step one complete. Step two: What to wear? A Tutu, of course. After a lengthy conversation about the appropriateness(or lack there of) of wearing a see through skirt to the doctors office, Lili figured it out. She needed the WHOLE outfit, leotard and all. Not just any leotard, the pink and purple sparkly one with the HUGE pink tutu, perfect!
Sparkly pink shoes are just the finishing touch this ensemble needs, now we can go. Luckily we have to go to school to pick Emma up a little early. That means there are 700 potential sets of eyes that can see Lili in all her pink tutu glory! Yeah for us! After making it down the hall with only a handful of curious glances, we make it to Emma's class room just in time for all the kids, in the whole school, to come in from recess. Great.
Here's the interesting part; no one seems particularly surprised to see Lili in this outfit. Hmmm.
Off we go, me, Emma and Miss Tutu herself. We are stopped by a group of teachers along the way and one of them says, "I always love to see what Lili will be wearing" (Fabulous, she's notorious) another teacher asked "oh, is she on her way to dance?" a very logical question considering the outfit. I respond, "Nope, we're on our way to the doctor". I can see their minds working, hoping against hope that we are going to see the psychologist, little do they know the appointment isn't even for me or Lili.
We make it to the doctors office with only a few curious glances from passengers in other cars, but this could be from the fact that we have all of the windows down and the "High School Musical 2" soundtrack blaring while we all, yes, even me, sing along at the top of our lungs. After a painfully long wait, we get to see the doctor, who tells Lili she looks lovely and is so glad she dressed up to come see her. No look of horror that I could possibly let her leave the house in that, no condescending glance implying I am the worst Mom ever, just a simple compliment to my funny, independent, outgoing 4 year old. And I realize, this lady is a Doctor, she had to go to school for a LONG time, she's really smart, and she doesn't think I 'm a bad mom. In fact, I think she approves of my parenting. I am so pleased I can hardly think straight. In fact, I feel so good about this whole tutu thing, I may wear one the next time I have an appointment,...then again, probably not. (By the way, Emma is fine, at least as "fine" as she can be with me as her Mom)
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
Editing at it's best!
I feel as though I need to explain the title of my blog "What The..." This phrase is a favorite around our household and it all started a couple of years ago with my nephew, Jake. Much to my delight, and my sisters dismay, Jake preferred to add a "what the HE**" to everything he said. Here are some examples: "Jake, it's time to get dressed" Jake's response, "What the He**!", "Jake, do you want to go outside?", Jake's response, "Sure, what the He**!" As you can see, this caused a bit of a problem for my sister. Turns out most people don't think a 3 year old swearing is very funny.
Now while my sister was going through this parenting challenge, I would sit and listen to her lament over how to deal with Jake, all the while giggling to myself that she finally had a "difficult" child. (Her oldest, Noah, is relatively easy going). She had experienced many laughs over the differences between our oldest daughter Chloe, and middle daughter, Emma. Emma tends to be a bit more vocal about her opinions, causing me to constantly question the benefits of multiple children. Since Jake is a couple of years younger than Emma, it was nice to see my older, wiser sister experiencing some, shall we say, challenging moments in parenting.
But, because my sister is one of the most determined people I know, she and Jake were able to come up with a compromise they both could live with, hence the saying "What the?!" Yeah! Jake had learned the art of clever editing!
Fast forward a few years, we now have our third daughter(and I thought 2 was a challange), Lili, who makes Emma look like a saint. Not that she is particularly bad, she is just slightly more determined to make sure we don't forget her, EVER! Lili has developed her own way to do pretty much everything. She prefers to wear clothes that twirl, even if that means putting pants on with both of her legs in one hole. While she is perfectly capable of talking, she prefers to sing, EVERYTHING, and, at 4 years old, she has decided that the whole world is better covered in glitter. Unfortunately, this need to make a statement has recently crossed over into her language skills. After a wind storm the other day, Lili walked outside to see her play hut tipped over. In front of me, her sisters, a neighbor and all of her kids, Lili asked in her loudest "outside" voice, "What the HE** happened to my play hut?" Needless to say I will be calling my nephew to get some tips on clever editing.
Now while my sister was going through this parenting challenge, I would sit and listen to her lament over how to deal with Jake, all the while giggling to myself that she finally had a "difficult" child. (Her oldest, Noah, is relatively easy going). She had experienced many laughs over the differences between our oldest daughter Chloe, and middle daughter, Emma. Emma tends to be a bit more vocal about her opinions, causing me to constantly question the benefits of multiple children. Since Jake is a couple of years younger than Emma, it was nice to see my older, wiser sister experiencing some, shall we say, challenging moments in parenting.
But, because my sister is one of the most determined people I know, she and Jake were able to come up with a compromise they both could live with, hence the saying "What the?!" Yeah! Jake had learned the art of clever editing!
Fast forward a few years, we now have our third daughter(and I thought 2 was a challange), Lili, who makes Emma look like a saint. Not that she is particularly bad, she is just slightly more determined to make sure we don't forget her, EVER! Lili has developed her own way to do pretty much everything. She prefers to wear clothes that twirl, even if that means putting pants on with both of her legs in one hole. While she is perfectly capable of talking, she prefers to sing, EVERYTHING, and, at 4 years old, she has decided that the whole world is better covered in glitter. Unfortunately, this need to make a statement has recently crossed over into her language skills. After a wind storm the other day, Lili walked outside to see her play hut tipped over. In front of me, her sisters, a neighbor and all of her kids, Lili asked in her loudest "outside" voice, "What the HE** happened to my play hut?" Needless to say I will be calling my nephew to get some tips on clever editing.
Monday, September 3, 2007
Carpentry is clearly not my thing
So my husband, Tom, and I decided to do some minor home improvements over this holiday weekend. The plan was clear and concise: move the existing fence which divides our front and back yards forward to the edge of the garage, thus giving us room to expand our garden. Now in my head I visualize us easily(KEY WORD) moving this 12 ft section of fencing forward, and then placing a few(KEY WORD) new pieces of fencing along the side to join the two sections. After about 10 minutes of watching Tom unscrew cedar planks, I realized this was NOT going to be the fun-filled family activity I had imagined.
I think now is the time to mention that our daughters were SO on board this project. All three of them were ready to jump in and "help". That lasted about 5 minutes.
Back to the fence...so we get the original fence down, new posts set and I am feeling pretty darn good. We have been working on this project together for a couple of hours and so far we haven't fought over my inability to use a drill, or the fact that the six hammers we own have all gone on a mysterious vacation to the land of the lost. The only incident has been when our 8 year old, Emma, realized she hates manual labor and would rather clean the entire house than work in the yard. So we move on to phase two, attaching the fence boards(picket's perhaps?) to the frame.(I am fully aware of the fact that there are correct terms for all of theses things, my lack of knowledge will become abundantly clear here in a minute...) Tom and I have come up with a brilliant plan, I will place the boards, using a spacer between each one and he will follow along and drill them into place. We couldn't believe how fast this went, we worked together like a finely tuned machine. The fence was finished in record time...but wait, turns out putting up a fence is one thing, putting up a STRAIGHT fence is a totally different thing.
Tom and I stepped back to inspect our handy work, and couldn't believe what we saw, our fence was leaning, significantly, to one side. How could this have happened? We had a SYSTEM! I even used a spacer! Never the less, the fence had to come down. We could not leave it up so crooked, what would the neighbors say?
Not to worry, we had a new plan. We placed a string across the top of where we wanted the fence to go, this ALWAYS works on TLC, right? Again we use our patented plan of me placing and spacing and Tom using the drill. Keep in mind we have now been at this project for several hours and we have even lost the support of our remaining two daughters. Apparently cleaning the house is TONS of fun. So the fence goes up for the second time. We carefully follow our string as a guide, certain that we have mastered this trade. Heck, Tom could open a fence building business, we are that good. The last piece is in place, we are tired, dirty and it has been about 900 degrees today(OK really only 90, but it sure felt a lot hotter, and really who can trust the weather man?) We step back and our perfectly straight fence is...still leaning. WHAT!? So much for the fencing business. Luckily the neighbors on that side aren't home much, cause the fence is staying the way it is, leaning and all. We're planting something tall on our side. Happy Labor Day!
I think now is the time to mention that our daughters were SO on board this project. All three of them were ready to jump in and "help". That lasted about 5 minutes.
Back to the fence...so we get the original fence down, new posts set and I am feeling pretty darn good. We have been working on this project together for a couple of hours and so far we haven't fought over my inability to use a drill, or the fact that the six hammers we own have all gone on a mysterious vacation to the land of the lost. The only incident has been when our 8 year old, Emma, realized she hates manual labor and would rather clean the entire house than work in the yard. So we move on to phase two, attaching the fence boards(picket's perhaps?) to the frame.(I am fully aware of the fact that there are correct terms for all of theses things, my lack of knowledge will become abundantly clear here in a minute...) Tom and I have come up with a brilliant plan, I will place the boards, using a spacer between each one and he will follow along and drill them into place. We couldn't believe how fast this went, we worked together like a finely tuned machine. The fence was finished in record time...but wait, turns out putting up a fence is one thing, putting up a STRAIGHT fence is a totally different thing.
Tom and I stepped back to inspect our handy work, and couldn't believe what we saw, our fence was leaning, significantly, to one side. How could this have happened? We had a SYSTEM! I even used a spacer! Never the less, the fence had to come down. We could not leave it up so crooked, what would the neighbors say?
Not to worry, we had a new plan. We placed a string across the top of where we wanted the fence to go, this ALWAYS works on TLC, right? Again we use our patented plan of me placing and spacing and Tom using the drill. Keep in mind we have now been at this project for several hours and we have even lost the support of our remaining two daughters. Apparently cleaning the house is TONS of fun. So the fence goes up for the second time. We carefully follow our string as a guide, certain that we have mastered this trade. Heck, Tom could open a fence building business, we are that good. The last piece is in place, we are tired, dirty and it has been about 900 degrees today(OK really only 90, but it sure felt a lot hotter, and really who can trust the weather man?) We step back and our perfectly straight fence is...still leaning. WHAT!? So much for the fencing business. Luckily the neighbors on that side aren't home much, cause the fence is staying the way it is, leaning and all. We're planting something tall on our side. Happy Labor Day!
Here I go...
I rock! I totally figured out how to set this up! Ok, my 9 year old daughter had to talk me through it, but still, it is done! Quite frankly I don't know what I am going to do with this new found outlet, I can barely respond to my email, I am the least computer savvy person ever. So if you are reading this by some strange twist of fate, there are a couple of things I can guarantee: 1. there will not be any sort of cute abbreviations on my blog. (LOL is the only one I even know about)
2. yes my daughters will be the main topic of writing for me seeing as they are pretty much my life.
3. there is a good chance I will end up making a complete fool of myself
There, that's it, short and sweet and to the point. Chloe, my nine year old, insists this will be fun, I guess we will see...
2. yes my daughters will be the main topic of writing for me seeing as they are pretty much my life.
3. there is a good chance I will end up making a complete fool of myself
There, that's it, short and sweet and to the point. Chloe, my nine year old, insists this will be fun, I guess we will see...
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