It's late. Tomorrow is Evil (Em's) eighth birthday.

K walks out the door for work; I dash out before he takes off to grab some stuff out of the van.
He picks up some bottled water for me from the back. (I'm freezing this so we can have cold water at our zoo picnic tomorrow.)
I pick up the grocery bag I forgot in the van earlier. There are marshmallows and extra powdered sugar in the bag.

The house is quiet. Too quiet. I hear giggles from the top of the stairs.

I think for only seconds before smiling.

"Who wants to bake a birthday cake?!?" I yell towards the stairs.

Little feet come running.

"Me! Me!" Em and A chorus.

I just shake my head. They're so predictable. It's ten-thirty at night and they're too excited about tomorrow to sleep. Well, I was too at their age.

The kids help me mix and measure, pour and stir. We get a full sheet pan filled with batter and into the oven to bake.

They keep opening the door to peek in.

I side track them by giving them eggs, cream, sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, and vanilla. I promised French Toast for breakfast tomorrow. The custard tastes better the longer it sits. So, they made the French Toast custard.

They still try to peek in the oven. The cake smells great, but isn't done yet.

I hand them a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, and two butter knives. I put them to work making sandwiches for the picnic.

I send them upstairs to brush their teeth again.

They troop back down stairs grinning and smelling minty fresh.

I pull the cake from the oven, top with parchment and set it to cool.

I look around and they're munching something else. Back upstairs to brush teeth.

Oh to be that young again and able to be excited about birthdays. This year will be my *shudder* 30th. It's safe to say I'm not taking aging too gracefully. Where did the time go?

I can remember being 21 and wild and free. I can remember 25, when I thought I was so wise and responsible. And now at 29, I just feel tired. Tired but very, very, very loved and full of love. I can safely say I've been there. I've done that. But I like where I am now: with two giggly kids plotting to sneak into the kitchen and eat cake before it's frosted... as soon as Mommy's asleep.

So, I'm in the bathroom and I hear Em and Captain Chaos playing in their room.

Em: Sir, you're going to have to take that off.

Me: Em, what are y'all playing?

Em: Doctor!

Me: Oh. Okay.

Huh? Take what off?

I creep down the hall and look into the room. On the exam bed is Captain Chaos. Em's taking off his socks and examining his feet.

Em: Look Mommy, I'm a podiatrist!

On Grocery Shopping

Ever since this pregnancy started, I've had moments of Mommy-fog quite unlike anything I've met before.

Usually this phenomena of "huh?-ness" happens in relation to a question from one of the kids.

Today's winner had to be Em and her response to grocery shopping.

Em: Mommy, where's the milk?
Me: *huh? Is she saying it's missing?* It's in the fridge.
Em: The fridge?
Me: You know, to keep it cold?!?
Em: Oh, yeah. Ok.

Me: *confused*

*******************
I love that the grocery stores in NE Ohio have free children's daycare centers in the stores. It helps cut down on the whole "Mommy-can-we-get-THAT?" issues that tend to arise when I let the children go with me through the store. I walk into the store, the kids head straight to the play center, I check them in, and I'm off to shop. I can use coupons without having a kid attempting to rearrange a display.

Grocery trips used to be nightmarish events.
My children, who can do no wrong in the eyes of passerby, would swoop into the produce section, remove the bottom melon from the display, and watch in fascination as Mommy would move with Superhuman speed to catch the remaining melons.
They would attempt to drive the cart and invariably run over a little old woman in a motorized cart. She'd smile and wave at them.
They'd even have the gall to open the box of cereal and freak out over the lack of a prize.

No punishment, no torture, and no lecture would make them stop the shenanigans.
But the childcare centers- to shop child free! Oh my!

Suddenly the trips are peaceful. There are no more screams of aggravation when I refuse to buy them ice cream or candy coated cereal. I can use coupons and save money by sticking to a list.

Captain Chaos has discovered girls. Or, to be more specific, he's discovered one girl: his sister, Em.

(The long delay in posting was due to a sudden extended trip to Texas to pick Em up... and a complete lack of internet.)

Em is his new hero. Em is seven (soon to be eight) so she's "older". She can play video games. She can READ. She can take a shower without assistance. She can brush her own hair and teeth. She eats all her dinner and gets dessert. She is, as he puts it, "SO COOL!"

Captain Chaos doesn't quite know if he should compete with her or idolize her. He follows her every step. He repeats everything she says. If she wants to color, they color. If she wants to watch a certain girly cartoon, he's all for it. I can't get the boy to take a single bite of steak. She cajoles him into eating an entire serving plus all his veggies!

It's as if someone replaced my chaotic little monster of a boy that I was used to having about with a charming, polite little man. It's a bit disturbing to think that the summer will be over in less than two months and I should enjoy his captivation while it lasts.

The House the WTF?!? Built...

This has been an insane week for me.

The Hubby and I have been trying for a bit to have another baby. After two losses last year, we pretty much were ready to stop trying. With all my health issues, though, it'd become standard procedure to take a test bi-weekly.

Imagine my great surprise when I finally tested positive.
Terror! Hope! Joy! Fear!

So, another babe's on the way. So far, things look pretty good. We're crossing our fingers (and toes) that this baby will be born healthy.

I've been asked frequently, "What do you want more? A boy or a girl?" Until you've had a miscarriage you can't really understand my answer: "A baby."

Captain Chaos has taken this opportunity to ask all sorts of interesting questions. His usual science curriculum has been postponed and he has been self-guiding on anatomy and health. It's funny to have my four year old remind me to take a walk "for the baby."

He's also been a bit more chaotic than normal. But those are posts for different times.
Tonight, it's time to rest the baby. : )

I am of the firm belief that the same people who design the McDonald's Play Places also design torture chambers at Guantanamo Bay.

The shrieking, the heart palpitations as you struggle to keep an eye on your child, the jumping in mid-air as an employee suddenly appears from no where to clean up a puddle of lemonade (or what you seriously hope is lemonade), even the costs of the food are designed to bring any parent with an indomitable spirit to tears.

Within minutes of arriving at a Play Land, I KNOW I'm moved to confess my inner-most secrets.
---------------------------------------
I can see it now, some strange masked bad guy threatening me with a ketchup-covered four year old:

"Confess, evil do-er!"

"Never!"

"Confess!"

"No!"

"Very well then... BWAHAAHAHA!!! To the Play Place with you!!!"

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooo. All right, all right, I admit it! I took the last piece of chocolate from Captain Chao's Halloween stash."

"...AAAAannnndddd?"

"And I hide a clean bath towel for my own personal use!"

"Any thing else you want to confess?"

"Noooooo!"

"Captain Chaos--- take her to the slides!"

"Wait! I... uh... I... wait until the kids are asleep and then I eat ice cream! With syrup! And Marshmallows!"

"I think she has been broken now... hehehehehe!"

--------------------------------------------------------

Another scenario I can imagine easily is a random terrorist being interrogated:

"Do you know what we do with your kind?"

"Torture us to make us talk?"

"Worse- we send you to the ball pit!"

"I suppose you call it a ball pit because it crushes my "jewels"?"

"No--- it's a pit. Filled with balls. And FOUR AND FIVE YEAR OLDS!!!!"

"Dude... that's against the Geneva Convention's policy on cruel and unusual punishment."
------------------------------------

Clumsiness is just in our genes...

From an early age, I've always been one to get a case of the "Whoopsies!" daily.

It's not that I try to whack my knees on every object in the house, or that I have a deep desire to fall UP a flight of stairs--- it just happens. Often.

My children also have inherited this amazing gene.

Captain Chaos has the ability to knock anything over with his bottom from six inches away. Emi-loo can trip over a dust mote. Even Brie, from reports, manages to sneeze and have her pants fall off.

So, when I hit my knee on the door of the mini-van today and managed to dislocate the knee cap (a thing that happens so often I have a set protocol for it) my husband didn't even blink twice. He just kind of sighed, got the pillow, an icepack (aka pack of frozen peas), and spent a good ten minutes manipulating my kneecap back into place.

I'm glad the man loves me. Otherwise he'd get pretty exasperated at the injury list and the fact that the doctor's office is on speed dial.

Mean Mommy Strikes Again

Also known as, Am I Over-reacting?So, it's a lovely day outside.
I send Captain Chaos outside to draw with his sidewalk chalk on the sidewalk just in front of the house.
He asks if he can ride his bike. No. I'm working and can't come outside to supervise him. (We have a MAJOR road in front of our house. No bike riding without a grown-up, even for Em.) I can however, sit so that I can see him coloring on the sidewalk.

So A wanders the porch for a few minutes, looking over the chairs that I got from freecycle. (I'm holding them on the porch to de-spider them until I can get out there with wood glue and make them a bit sturdier.) I hear him banging around, don't think anything of it because he's right behind me.

It gets quiet. I see him at the bottom step. I'm assuming that he's coloring on the sidewalk.
I turn around, type some more, something's bugging the back of my mind.

*Ding* When I saw him at the bottom of the porch, I didn't see his bike on the porch.

Damn. I turn around, glance out the window- No A, no bike.

I curse under my breath, K looks up from his game and asks what's wrong. As I dash out the door, I explain. He curses loudly.

I look around, there's no A anywhere that I can find.

I'm cursing loudly and screaming his name by this point. I'm heading down the sidewalk in my jammies. (I'd been cleaning and working on the site all morning.)

He finally answers me. He'd fallen over, and was trying to get his bike off of him- behind a neighbor's hedge.
He drags his bike back to the house, gives me an "I'm sorry" look, then grins.

I'm livid. I'm having a heart attack.
"INSIDE NOW!"

He goes inside and I hear his dad quietly tell him to take his jacket off. His dad is NEVER quiet.

I get his bike back on the porch, come in and ask if he had permission to go bike riding.

"No."
"Well, why did you?"
"I needed to think."
"Well buster, you've got a ton of time to think IN YOUR ROOM FOR THE REST OF THE DAY! AND NO TV!"

Gah. My chest phsyically hurts from this kid's antics.

Now to go make him lunch and take it to him in his room.

*whimper* The girls were so easy compared to this.

Oh no! He'll be an Advertiser...

Ok, Captain Chaos is officially an "odd" child.

(Yes, we ALL knew that already- but I have proof.)

He's discovered info-mercials.

He LOVES info-mercials.

You know, those cheesy half-hour paid advertisements for the "brand new, latest, and greatest thing you MUST have..."

It started with the Debbie Meyer Green-Bags. They claim to make your produce last twice as long. Every time I get vegetables out of the fridge he asks me if they are in a "green bag". Same thing at the store.

Other infomercials he approves of is the original Oxi-Clean commercials, Yoga-booty-ballet, moon-sand, tater-mitts, Ove-glove, bedazzler, bug wand vac, and ANYTHING Matthew Lesko.


Tonight's was Super Sweeper Plus--- apparently it's a carpet sweeper with a rubber brush that is supposed to pick up more than a normal carpet cleaner.
He insisted he had to watch it.

My son is weird.

Blue Moon...

And Captain Chaos has managed to dye himself blue again.

Yes. Again.

Apparently he also did this on Wednesday night while I was at knitting.

He walks into the room and mentions in passing that he's going to go wash his hands. His Dad and I both look up briefly, say, "Ok", did a double take and both yelled, "Whoa. Hold it right there mister! Come here."

Yep. He was blue.

___________________

As a side note, the list of contraband items to never send my kids now includes face paint, bath dye tablets, and markers. Washable crayons are still acceptable

So why am I up at the butt-crack of dawn?

I love my son. And well, I was slightly awake. So, when the door opens and Captain Chaos wanders in, looks warily at his Dad (who, since he works night shift rarely sleeps in bed with me and is an odd sight) and whispered in a loud voice, "Mommy, I need new underwears. They're in the car in my Power Rangers backpack." I was ready for it.

Night time peeing and pooing is truly 99% accidental in kids. They can't help it. And he so rarely does it at night, I can forgive it.

So, he has no roos and his roos are in the car. I am NOT getting dressed to go outside right now at butt crack of dawn in the ghetto. I'd just washed underwear for him. I must love my son. I trotted my feet down to the basement where I stood in my half-dressed glory exposed to anyone that happened to be stalking my basement windows (and living a pretty boring life as a blind person now) rummaging through the dryer looking for roos for a soggy little boy.

The sock monsters have struck with the roos as well now. I washed fifteen pairs two days ago. By my count he's worn nine. He has one pair in his backpack. That should leave five left. Nope. I finally found one pair in the sleeve of a t-shirt and extracted it. By that time, I was already awake, had folded the laundry after rummaging stopped working, and picked out A's clothes for the day.

My soggy little boy, all dry and clean in new roos posed another question. Where would he sleep? His bed was wet. I stuck him in the guest room. It took him nearly ten minutes to transfer all his "friends" - stuffed animals, toy cars, trains, etc...- to the other room.

After all that, as I'm leaving the room after tucking him in, he asks me, "Mommy, can I have a drink? I'm thirsty...."

*facepalm*

The Chase Begins Young

Captain Chaos has always been a bit of a flirt.

I have proof of this.

Yesterday he spent a few pouty minutes complaining that none of the little girls would play with him at the play place. They bonded together in tiny pink communes, choosing instead to infest the upper crawlways of the McDonalds playplace. Any boys attempted to enter this mini-estrogenized zone were deterred by the sheer amount of pink within view.

Not so my Captain Chaos. You see him crawl swiftly into their midst as they pretended to pour tea for small stuffed animals. Then he stood up, and in his best dinosaur impersonation growled loudly.

There was an immediate explosion of dainty screams and a flurry of activity as the pink masses burst apart at the seams and scrambled away as quickly as possible.

Uncertain of which way to chase first, my little charmer followed the older girls as they screamed their way in excitement down the slide. As abruptly as they parted, he began chasing the younger group who screamed as they bolted in another direction.

He tried charm. They rebuked him with high pitched squeals. He tried prose. More screams. Finally he resorted to the only weapon left in his arsenal of cuteness.

He reached out with one finger, tapped the oldest girl on the shoulder, and said clearly, “Tag. You’re IT!”

He ran… and suddenly was chased by little girls. I hear girly screaming of a different sort--- and my son Captain Chaos runs by, his pants slowly falling off his non-existent butt from the running, being chased by a mass of pink and bows.

Reasons to Wake Up

It is possible to sleep with a cat perched on your shoulder.

However, it's impossible to sleep with Captain Chao's sharp, bony toes stuck into your kidneys.

It's possible to sleep with a cat kneading your hip.

It's impossible to sleep when Captain Chaos stops snoring suddenly.

It's possible to sleep while the kitty goes to the litter box and pees.

It's impossible to sleep while Captain Chaos forgets to go to the potty and pee.
=================

Luckily, Captain Chaos doesn't pee the bed at night anymore.
Luckily, Captain Chaos snored softly all night long.
Luckily, Captain Chaos didn't manage to find my kidneys with his toes.

But.... the cat did manage to sneeze in my ear.

I guess it was a good thing I was already awake and had had an excellent night of sleep.

The Things We Learn in Homeschool

Captain Chaos climbs into bed with me this morning.

He sits under the blanket for a few minutes just snuggling before turning over.

Captain Chaos : Morning Mommy!

M: eh... *yawn* Morning sweetie. Wanna sleep and cuddle a bit?

Captain Chaos : Ok.

*snuggles down*

Captain Chaos : Mommy? Who's eyes are these?

M: *opens eyes with confusion. Captain Chaos is pointing to his own eyes* What do you mean?

Captain Chaos : My eyes are blue. Who's eyes are these?

M: You mean like are they like Mommy's or Daddy's?

Captain Chaos : Yeah. Your eyes are blue.

M: No. My eyes are hazel. Your eyes are blue. Daddy's eyes are amber. But blue eyes run in Mommy's family. That's genetics.

Captain Chaos : *pausing to think with furrowed brow* Genetics? What's genetics?

M: It's when a Mommy and a Daddy get together to make a baby and the baby grows into a big kid that looks a certain way.

Captain Chaos : *thinking* Like a kid with blue eyes?

M: Yes.

Captain Chaos : Or a kid with green hair.

M: Yes. *note- I'm trying to end the conversation and go to sleep*

Captain Chaos : Or a Mommy with stinky breath?

M: Or a little boy with a spanked hiney!

Captain Chaos : *giggles then begins sing-songing* Genetics! Genetics! Genetics!!! Genetics!!!

I finally gave up and took him downstairs for breakfast. He sang the word genetics until he had a yogurt cup in hand.