Adios!

I know I've been slacking off on writing again lately. I've just been a busy little bee lately, and you all are just going to have to wait a little longer for any sort of update. I know, you're crushed, confused, and completely disheartened. But I'm heading to Mexico in two days with Eric and some friends and you KNOW I'll have some stories.

I'll miss my little kidlets though. Most of the time. Nora's been all sorts of fun lately with her new stripping in public habit. Tate's decided that sitting on my lap and then farting is just the be-all, end-all. So yeah, those things I won't miss.

Date Night

Have you ever taken a 3 year old to any sort of Sesame Street/Disney/Ice Capades type event? I have. Just did it tonight, in fact. Tate and I had a night out at the social event of the...hour. It went surprisingly smoothly, for the most part...pretty much, kinda.

As soon as I sat down, I felt like we were living on borrowed time. You know, where you just kinda sit and watch the kid, observing the initial excitement starting to wane and boredom and tiredness slowly creep in. Now, we had front row seats (yeah, I got an in with Elmo. What can I say) so at least we were RIGHT THERE. The problem was, we were RIGHT THERE at the very far side of the stage, so for much of the performance we had a nice view of furry blue and red and yellow...asses.

The characters did come out on the floor quite a bit though, so Tate got a lot of high fives and hair ruffles. I got a lot of ginormous, rock-hard, freaking 500 lb Muppet feet kicking me in the instep and clomping on my toes. I usually managed to bite my tongue before letting a profanity slip out. No reason to be teaching random kidlets something new besides the alphabet that evening.

Basically, the evening could be broken down like so:

FIRST 20 MINUTES: Tate: "Ooooh! Elmo! Cookie Monster! Let's get up and dance and sing and wave and freak out with general unabashed three-year-old joyfulness!" Me: "Aww, it's so fun to watch Tate enjoy himself. Such a joyous experience for mother and son."

SECOND 20 MINUTES: Tate: "Mommy, that little boy has an Elmo toy. Can I get an Elmo toy? Where are the Elmo toys? I think I need to go potty. Ooh, Cookie Monster just gave me a high five! I love Grover! Where are the Elmo toys?" Me: "Let's wait til the break, honey. There is a break, right? Shouldn't there be a break right about now? How long can these furry beings sing about sharing and the ocean and imagining crap??"

BREAK: Tate: "ELLLMOOOOOOO TOY!!! PLEASEPLEASEPLEASE!! I HAVE TO GO POTTY AGAIN! CAN I HAVE SOME POPCORN? THAT KID HAS POPCORN!" Me: "Oh my God, where are the stupid Elmo toys? Here, lady, here's your $4000 dollars for a cheap piece of plastic with Elmo's face on it. Oh look, and there's a guy walking around with Elmo balloons throughout the audience, 2 inches away from each kid. Hey pal, where's your sign saying 'Parents, if you make me walk right by your kid without buying them a balloon, you're telling them that you don't love them' ?? Awesome. Let's buy a balloon."

THIRD 20 MINUTES: Tate, as he wonks himself absentmindedly in the head with the freaking Elmo toy: "Soooo...Mom. What are you doing? Should I brush my teeth when I get home? Where's my popcorn? I think I have to go potty again. POO. I have to go POO. Does Abby Cadabby go poo? She doesn't have a pee-pee." Me: "Why don't they sell wine at these things? How can they sing 30 songs about the letter K?" Tate again: "Where's my drink made out of red dye and sugar? YOU THREW IT AWAY??? I WANT MY RED DRINK! Watch as I shimmy out of my chair and flop around desperately on the floor trying to suck up any puddles of red!"

All in all, it was a success. I kept myself occupied by snickering each time one of the characters wiped out on stage, which happened surprisingly often. Or maybe not all that surprisingly. Those feet are freaking heavy. I know. I still can't feel my toe from when Cookie Monster flattened it with his colossal paw. Big blue bastard. I also kept busy dreaming up ways to silence the brat behind me wailing "BEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRTTTTTTTT!!!! I ONLY WANT TO SEE BEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRTTTTTTTT!! NO ERNIE! NO BIG BIRD!! SHUT UP, GRANDMA YOU'RE STUPID!!!" Yeah, that kid was really pleasing to be around.

Nora and I had a little time together this morning, as well. She and I went to my friend's house for a little knitting and chatting time. Let's just say I'm a hell of a lot better at chatting than knitting. I would get to a certain point and then completely lose all coordination, patience, and even a minuscule sense of something resembling skill. Pretty much, I suck. I got to the point where I just put the needles down and declared I was done. Funny thing was, nobody really argued with me at that point. I think I may be a knitting failure. Oh well. There are other things I'm good at. Shut up, I'm serious.

Sweet Cheez-its.

Tate's becoming a pro at this whole preschool thing. Every morning as we drive there, he exclaims "I'm SO excited, Mom!" and every afternoon as we drive home, he gives me a garbled rundown of all his activities that day. Usually it's how they learned about dinosaurs or apples or owls, but last week was something rather...unexpected. This was the scene in the car ride home:

Me: "So, what did you learn about today, Tate?"
Tate: "Cheez-its."
Me: "...Cheez-its?"
Tate: "Yep. Cheez-its."
Me: "You mean you had Cheez-its at snack time?"
Tate: "NO! WE TALKED ABOUT CHEEZ-ITS!!"

Now, at this point I'm wondering if the teacher just plain ran out ideas of what to talk about that day and conducted an impromptu lecture on the joys of unnaturally orange snack crackers. Perhaps she had had a ferocious craving for them for one reason or another. Maybe she just wanted to make sure all the little children were able to revel in the wonder of...Cheez-its. I don't know.

Me: "Well, uh, what did you learn about Cheez-its? Are they yummy?"
Tate: "Mom. NO. Don't be silly."
Me: "O...K..."
Tate: "Cheez-its is our friend. Cheezi-its lives up in the sky."
Me: "Tate. Do you maybe, by chance, mean JESUS?"
Tate: "YES. CHEEZ-ITS."

Therrrrre we go. Tate will now be saying his evening prayers to a gigantic box of cheese-flavored squares floating merrily in the sky, looking down on all the little children telling them to do unto others as they would do unto them.

And if anyone knows the patron saint of missing shoes and socks, hit me up with their digits or something. Because I have like no foot coverings of any sort for any person in my house at this point. Now, things are even more cluttered and disorganized around here than usual. Eric's working 14 hour days, 6 or 7 days a week so I'm pretty much Single Mommy these days. The kids aren't much for washing windows or scrubbing down baseboards, and also aren't really fans of letting me out of their sight for more than 3 minutes before pushing each other down the stairs or off the couch. Or out of the laundry hamper, toy shopping cart or clothes dryer. Therefore, I do not get much done. Well, really, anything done. It ain't pretty.

So today, I was in the usual chaos of trying to pin down both kidlets long enough to wrestle them into their clothes. I took a clean pair of matched socks off the kitchen table (yes, we have clean laundry on the kitchen table. It's usually only there for about 5 or 6 days. Then we'll have a different load of clean laundry on the kitchen table.) and put them on the couch. I left for 20 seconds, came back, and there was only one sock on the couch. The other sock apparently got so fed up with the disarray around here it staged a protest and stormed off. I made a quick check to ensure it wasn't stashed in Nora's cheek, and asked Tate if he took the sock.

Tate: "I'll help you look, Mommy. It's ok"
Me: "Gee, thanks. Why don't you tell me where you put it?"
Tate: "Um....your name is Nemo."
Me: "Awesome. That's the next place I was gonna look anyway."

I still haven't found it. I seriously think it made a desperate dash for freedom, to find a world where socks can run free without being stuffed into random cupboards or left in the car under one of the seats for years at a time or chewed on by little girls. A world where Tate's shoe doesn't end up in the clothes hamper, where mittens are no longer hidden inside the broom closet, where my hairbrush doesn't find itself buried under a foot of sand in the sandbox outside. It just unfolded itself, bid it's mate adieu and ran. Goodbye, sock. It's ok. There are days where it's simply easier to run to the store and buy new socks rather than wash and try to match up the ones you already have. There are always more socks out there.

But maybe it's just me and my stance on cleaning. Like the average person out there and I most likely have different views on what exactly "just do it" means in terms of cleaning. For most people, it might mean setting aside an entire day to to clean the hell out of your house: scraping old food off the oven, shoveling the dust out from behind the couches, sweeping out mummified carrots from behind the fridge. For me, "just do it" means finally bending down and picking up that piece of paper towel on the floor instead of just kicking it out of my way 100 times a day. Hey, every little bit helps.

Ok, for any of you who are A) not parents and therefore not used to dealing with this kind of stuff or B) extremely grossed out by gooey things, let's just save you major discomfort right now by saying this: SLIMY GREEN EYE BOOGERS. Oh, and EYELIDS CRUSTED TOGETHER WITH GOOPY, STRINGY, MUCOUS-Y EYE MATTER. And what the hell...DIARRHEA. Yep, you can leave now. I understand.



Yeah, the kids have pinkeye. I started to suspect something when Tate woke up this morning unable to open his right eye due to it being glued together with slimy yellowish glop. Oh, and when Nora's eyes both started looking kinda swollen and, uh...pink. Well, pink aside from the neon-green slime slithering out of the corners of her eyes and instantly hardening on her cheek, dying a quick and painful death. Pretty. Oh, yeah, and the diarrhea. That was fun too. Especially when it got embedded under my fingernails and splattered up onto my neck. I have to say though, you know you're a mom when you can strip your kid naked. scrub the poo off them and you, and wedge them between your knees and wrestle them back into clean clothes, all while keeping the phone firmly wedged against your ear, chattering a mile a minute with your friend, not missing a beat.



After taking both kids to the walk-in clinic where Tate managed to make the nurse almost fall off the stool when he snuck up behind her and lifted the little lever that makes the stool go "pphhhhffft" and drop like a rock, we headed to Target to get the prescriptions.


Holy Hell.


Normally I'm a fan of Target. However, I've realized that this is because I'm normally smart enough to not take both of my kids there at 5:15 pm. But since I needed to get eye drops I really had no choice. So we went. And waited for 45 minutes for eyedrops. Forty. Five. Minutes. I mean, really. Watching Tate hit Nora over the head with a plastic hanger gets old after like 8 minutes, people. So that left a whole 37 minutes to kill. And this is how I killed it.

"Tate, please stop doing that. Tate, I said stop. Seriously, STOP. Ok, really. Will you please stop. Just DON'T. OK??? WILL YOU NOT DO THAT?? COME BACK HERE. Look at me. I'm walking away. Really. No, Tate, I am. Walking. Away. Ok, this is supposed to make you FOLLOW ME. No, follow ME. Not the smelly 500 lb man with toilet paper hanging off his shoe. ME. Ok, where are you. Seriously not funny! WHAT CLOTHES RACK ARE YOU HIDING UNDER?? STOP PULLING ALL THE CARDS OFF THE SHELF. STOP LICKING THE DVD CASES. STOP OPENING THE HOME PREGNANCY TEST BOXES. STOP TRYING TO CRAWL INTO THE PHARMACY. SANTA WILL NOT BRING YOU ANY TOYS IF YOU KEEP SQUIRTING ME WITH KY JELLY"

Yeah. Just imagine 37 minutes of that. And 37 minutes of Tate going:

"No. No! NO! NONONONONONONONONO!!! I want to! I want Nora to cry! I HAVE TO! BYE BYE MOMMY!!! NO! NO! NO!NO!NO!NO! Are you very happy with me, Mommy?"

And Nora going:

"NUM NUM!! MAMAMAMA!!! NUM NUM!! MORE!!! MAMAMAMA! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!"

By the time we left the store I was down to saying three words. It's all my brain could process. "Don't. Stop. Go. Stop. Go. Don't." I do believe it was a glimpse into the 8th circle of hell. Just remember, kids, Mommy is always 2 seconds away from Crazy.

But we got home. I think I got the drops in Tate's eye. It's kind of hard to tell when they're thrashing around like a demented, possessed Jack Russell terrier on crack. I know I got them in Nora's because she just laid there and looked at me like "well, what the fresh hell is this, you crazy woman?" while I dripped them in there. Then she trotted away with her Dum-dum and proceeded to drop it in the dog's water bowl.

Yep, good day. I know experiences like these are a huge part of the job description of being a mommy, but sheesh. This job is so freaking hard, and I have a feeling my performance review is not going to set me up for a promotion. Although, really, what do you get promoted to from Mother? God?

Candy? What Candy?

I'm pretty convinced that toddler ears are tuned to a certain frequency that allows them to hear candy being opened from anywhere in the house. Seriously. I have the Halloween goods stashed away in a corner of the house we're rarely in to discourage the kids (and myself...who am I kidding) from going through it in a mad, sugar-crazed frenzy more than a couple times a day. I swear, whenever I notice the kids are upstairs without me and probably smearing Vaseline all over the dogs, rugs and toilet seats, and creep over to the stash of candy to snag something, it always ends the same way. I open the wrapper. I hear: Thump. Thump. Thumpthumpthudthudthudthud. Pitter patter pitter patter. Then I turn around and my two little angels will be standing before me, bent over with their hands on their knees, panting madly and gasping for breath as they hold a hand up in the air and force out "Ma..ma....candy?"

Every. Time.

But I figure, the more they eat, the less I do. And since my body apparently hates me and refuses to acknowledge that I've been hitting the gym almost EVERY FREAKING DAY, it's probably best I don't stuff my face with chocolate all that often. I swear these days it's like I can gain weight by osmosis. I have to sprint through the chip aisle in the grocery store for fear my fat cells will start expanding just from breathing too deeply near the Doritos. Seriously, it's like my metabolism is sitting in a corner rocking back and forth with it's hands over it's ears going "I can't heeeeeeear you! I don't belieeeeeeeve that you're on a treadmill!!! I've decided to totally screwwwwwwww you!!" And, on that note, why does 30 minutes on the treadmill feel like two and a half hours, while the two and a half hours that Tate's in preschool go by in a 30 minute blink? Just wondering.

Anyway. Back to the original subject. Halloween was pretty low-key this year. Eric worked, as he has like practically every single other day this year, so it was just me and the kidlets hitting the streets. How cute are they?

Uh...good evening folks. This is your Tater speaking.


Heeeere, kitty kitty.

And then there's me, the Friday before Halloween, doing shots at a party with Kate Gosselin and Jessica Simpson. I may have to go platinum blonde on a permanent basis. On account of my sassiness and all. And yes, we're doing Jell-O shots, simply because we are classy in that way.

It was good times...from what I remember, anyway.

Out of the Mouths of Babes

All of a sudden, Nora is really talking. A new word here, a new word there. "Please", "Cheese", "Okay" "Tate" and, uh..."Gracias." I don't know if she's decided to be half Spanish, or if Tate is sneakily teaching her a foreign language in one his late-night seminars on How to Drive Mom as Crazy as Possible in 100 Days or Less or Your Money Back. One of these days they're going to playing in the next room and I'll hear Tate say "Vamos a ir a tomar una botella de vodka del armario y de un paseo en coche." Nora will reply back with "Si, senor diablo!". And I'll sit there in blissful ignorance and all of a sudden wonder why I'm missing a bottle of vodka, the kids, and the car.



I don't know what Nora's trying to say when "gracias" comes out, since she throws it out there at pretty random times. I do know, however, she's trying to say "thank you" when in fact what actually comes out of her angelic little mouth is "fuck you!". Yeah, that's a fun one. If I'm in a punchy mood at the grocery store, I'll hand her a bag of rice or something to play with just so I can watch people's faces as she shouts out "FUCK YOU, MA!!!!" with nothin' but a smile on her face. I have a feeling I'm pretty much known as the Crazy Mother with Strange Children at Festival by this point. Which I'm fine with. It was a long time coming.



She's also still bidding people "Die!" as she leaves them, waving her little hand frantically. I particularly enjoy when I lay her down for her nap, and after she's given me a hug and a kiss she'll lift her head up and holler "DIE, MA!" and then flop back down, curl in a ball, and fall asleep. Gives me a warm fuzzy feeling all through naptime.



Tate's favorite phrase is (get ready to judge me) "Oh...for God's SAKE!". He says it 300 times an hour. We also get a lot of double takes and strange looks in public when he breaks that one out. And apparently it's a pretty universal phrase. Happy, sad, angry, hungry, bewildered...it all merits an "Oh...for God's SAKE!" Examples:



Me: "Tate, can you get your jacket on, please?"

Tate: "Oh, for God's SAKE, Mom!"

Me: "Ok, say goodbye to your teacher before we leave."

Tate: "Oh...for...God's...SAKE!!!"

Me: "Goodnight, Tate. I love you."

Tate: "OH! FOR! GOD'S! SAKE!"

And on and on. Sometimes it's mumbled, sometimes it's shouted, sometimes it comes out of nowhere while he's watching Sesame Street (apparently Grover is extremely annoying). And, yes, since everyone's thinking it anyway, he learned it from me. I know. The Mother of the Year award is on it's way.

It Was Epic

Epic, I tell you. Ep. Ic.

What was epic, you say? Why, I say, the tantrum that Tate threw at the YMCA yesterday, that's what! I have seen more than my fair share of Tate tantrums (Tatetrums?). I've got enough stored up to last me until I am 9802 years old. This one, though, was one to go in the history books. I should totally write a book about the history of tantrums, and how my dear son has committed his very being to the art of sharing tantrums with the world at every possible opportunity, in every possible place, in front of EVERY POSSIBLE PERSON IN THE WORLD. I would rock that.

Basically, I wanted him to put on his jacket before going out in 40 degree weather. He disagreed, somewhat strongly. I told him that we would not be budging from the spot we were standing in until he put on his jacket. He would budge, I would replace him in his original spot, he would wail and thrash and lunge for the handicap button to open the door (his form of crack), I would replace him, etc etc freaking etc for 30 minutes. I know I am prone to exaggeration every once in a great while, but it was literally a half hour. 1800 seconds of hollering, caterwauling, bellowing, trying to remove random parts from Mommy's body with his teeth, what have you. Nora would wander off for a bit, come wandering back, frantically sign "eat" for a few minutes, realize I was not about to magically produce a plate full of ravioli from under my clothing, and wander back off in search of people to beg food from, or tables to scour for crumbs under. She was a peanut on a mission.

Finally I got tired of watching people steadfastedly, pointedly ignore my psychotic toddler as he tried to hurl himself through the front doors of a public venue and decided to get the jacket on, get through the doors, and get home where I could start pouring wine down my throat because I was thisfreakingclosetolosingmysanity. So I did...somehow. I still don't know how I did it, since he seemed to think the jacket was the spawn of Satan, but I ended up with him tucked under one arm, Nora in the other, and wearily trudging out to my car wondering why I ever decided to open my uterus for business. Good times.

Then I took Nora to the grocery store and she dropped a full can of enchilada sauce on my foot. I'm convincing myself, perhaps futilely, that it was not intentional. If my 18-month-old starts trying to break my metatarsals on a regular basis now, I think it may be time to wave the white flag and just letting the kidlets start the dictatorship they seem so intent on cultivating. Hey, I tried. Not many 31-year-olds can say they got their ass kicked by a couple of kids who like to run around naked after bathtime and roll themselves up in curtains. That's something. It IS.

And Unto Tate, A Child Was Born

Tate and I had a fun conversation the other day. Sometimes I just gotta wonder what goes through that brain of his. The rundown:

Tate: Mommy, I have a baby in my tummy!
Me: Oh, really? How did it get there?
Tate: The spaceship flew it into there and then it had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Now it's living in my tummy. Remember when I did that? When I was in your tummy?
Me: Yes, I do remember that. Do you?
Tate: Yes. That was so fun. I'd run around and go "Wheeeee!"
Me: Well, sometimes it certainly felt like that. Do you remember doing your best to dislodge my rib with your heel? Cause that was really fun for me, too. What kind of baby do you have in your tummy?
Tate: A girl. Her name is Hammer.
Me: Always an option for the next kid. Not many little Hammers running around these days.

I tried to get him to continue the conversation but he got distracted by a patch of sunlight on the wall or something and wondered off. Later, when I tried to ask him about Baby Girl Hammer in his tummy, he looked at me like I had been sneaking hits from the bong when his back was turned. I guess it was a short pregnancy.

The four of us went to get our pictures taken this past week. I was not entirely optimistic, seeing as both kids were turning into snot fountains, Eric had worked all night the night before and not gone to bed yet, and I was annoyed at Eric for not being totally excited and exhilirated about getting his picture taken after being awake for like 18 hours. Small detail.

Anyway, things went surprisingly well. Tate had to be...himself, and did plenty of looking the complete opposite direction of the camera with his patented little smirk on his face while pretending he was deaf, but the creepy, ugly, freaky rubber chicken that the photographer waved in both kids' faces did a great job of coaxing a decent number of smiles out of them. I'm really happy with the ones we've seen so far. See? Look how cute we are.



And just for kicks, here are the little rapscallions at this time last year. Sniff. They look so little and innocent. Well, ok, only Nora looks innocent. Tate hasn't looked innocent since he came shooting out of the womb.

Take Me to Your Leader

I took Nora in for her 18 month check up yesterday. In the past 6 months, she's gained a grand total of 3, count 'em 3 lbs, bringing her up to a whopping 22 lbs even. Now, considering the fact that she shoves a total of 22 lbs of food in her mouth every 12 hours, this is somewhat impressive. I've come to the conclusion that she has either A) a hollow leg, B) a tapeworm, or C) some sort of alien DNA coursing through her veins. I have never known a human being to shove this sheer amount of food in their mouth on a 23 an hour a day basis and only gain like an ounce a month. She's from another planet. I gave birth to ET's sweet, plucky, teeny-tiny, second cousin or something.

Tate has learned the fine art of lying. We're extremely proud. I keep insisting that Eric take the credit passing down this laudable trait, but he seems to think it's something that can only be passed from a loving mother down to her mentally pliable, impressionable son. The other day Tate and I were coming in from the garage to the house. I had 4000 grocery bags in my arms and Nora hanging off my neck, writhing and squealing as she tried to separate my eyebrows from my forehead. This was our exchange:

Me: "Tate, can you please open the door for Mommy?"

Tate: "No. My hands are full."

Me: "Is it hard work, carrying all that air?? Open the door."

Tate: "I just CANNOT right now. My HANDS are FULL."

Me: "Oh, right. I failed to notice that gigantic speck of lint on your palm. I'm surprised you haven't been reduced to dragging your hand along behind you, grunting and groaning as you strain to take every step. Please, please let me put down my 600 pounds of groceries and stash Nora down my shirt or something so you don't pull a muscle by trying to balance a piece of fuzz in one hand while wrenching open the door with the other."

Tate: "Ok, Mommy."

Then we have the typical situation where he pushes Nora down while standing 3 feet in front of me, then quickly saying "I didn't do anything!" Right. I may be a little slow on the uptake sometimes but I'm pretty sure he's not able to inadvertently knock people over with an innocent flick of his eyeballs.

I took the kids on a hayride this morning. Nora, as usual, was so thrilled she simply lost all expression in her face. It takes a lot to impress this kid.

What the hell, Ma.

Tate and good ol' One Eye.

I may be a liar, but I'm stinkin' cute, too.

It was a really good time, but the whole getting-in-and-out-of-the-car process made me really, really not excited for winter. It takes 45 minutes to get everyone's crap into the car, and then you get where you're going and take another 3 hours to get both kids crammed into their hats and mittens and jackets and boots and other stuff they insist on wearing because they want to be warm or something. After I'm done getting them ready in their 40 layers of clothes, I'm about to strip all mine off because I'm panting and sweating and about to fall over from fatigue. Then Nora poops in her diaper and Tate starts screaming because he doesn't like the way his zipper smells and I start mumbling that this taking the kids out stuff is for the birds and next time we're just staying home and wearing the same clothes for 2 weeks at a time because even though I remember all the kids' clothes I inevitably forget something of mine, like, oh, my shoes. It's good times.

Can't wait for winter. Can. Not. Wait.

I Got You, Babe

I know. Yes, I know. Really. You all have been tormented and left feeling strangely alone and unfulfilled by the lack of blogging. Well, too bad. I was in a really bad mood for about a month and any nugget of humor in my life was hiding deep under all the clutter in my family room. So I didn't have any desire to put my bitchy moanings and rantings down for all the world to see.

But I'm back now. Clap, clap.


To jump right in, let's start with the recent makeover we had. This is what my dear little Nora had been looking like:
Lovely, isn't she? Just pure sweetness and delicacy. What a little flower, all abloom with dainty and cute. Actually, to get the real picture, you'd have to imagine this 'do with food and lint and, I don't know, baby raccoons hanging off of it. She was like Little Miss Dustmop Head. Plus there was the whole issue of her not being able to, you know, SEE. We got tired of hearing the thumps as she careened into walls and took headers down the stairs. Kidding.

So I took her in for a little snip snip and here she is now:

Or maybe this is her. They've pretty much got identical hairstyles. She's still working on the moustache, though. I'm trying to get her to start answering to "Sonny" and teaching her to sing "I got flowers, in the spring....I got you, to wear my RIIIIING". It's slow going.

She's learning a lot of new words, although her favorite is still "BladabladaBLAHBLAHBLAH". So far that's seemed to have meant "cup", "sponge" "blackened banana peel" and "Mommy's arm fat". But she's also got "Doggie" "Airplane" "Thank you" (which comes out sounding like "Dankmnn"), and still, of course "BOB!!!!!! STOP!!!". She also likes to bid people adieu by saying "bye", although when she says it, it comes out as "Die". So I often hear her sweet little voice warbling "Die, Ma! DIE DIE, MA!" It's a little disconcerting. I keep expecting to turn around and see her coming at me with a stick in her hand or something.

And let's not forget about this little tornado:

I'm sure you'll be shocked to hear he's still the same bounce-off-the-walls, yell-at-the-top-of-his-lungs, make-Mommy-drink-straight-out-of-the-winebox little dude he always was. He's in preschool now and adores it. I've also got him in swimming and gymnastics in vain attempts to burn off some of the energy he has stored. He enjoys those classes too, but refuses to let them tire him out in any way, shape or form. Truly, how daft and moronic of me to hold out any pathetic little morsel of hope. I chalk it up to sleep deprivation and just pure desperation. Can I get an hour of downtime in the afternoon, people? No? How about 20 minutes? 10? Periodic escapes to the bathroom where I feign gastrointestinal troubles? Nope. These children follow me everywhere.

And now, my brief reintroduction back into the world of blogging must end for today. Nora is chucking cut up fruit at the dogs and Tate is trying to crawl into the dishwasher and shut the door. Better I don't do too much all at once anyway. I don't want to pull a muscle.

Show Me Your Booty

We've been busy lately, as evidenced by the fact I have not bothered to blog in like two and a half weeks. I've just heard once or twice that things like fresh air and exercise are supposed to be good for kids or something, so we've been outside a lot. Then we come inside and I herd the kids to bed and all I want to do is sit on the couch and not use any part of my brain. This is why I watch "Dating in the Dark". No brainpower required.

We did, however, make a trek to Minneapolis for my cousin's wedding and then on to Nantucket with the whole fam. It was a nice time. Some things I did not do while there:

1) Meet "the man from Nantucket". I did, however, buy a t-shirt proclaiming that I am the man from Nantucket. I live for irony.

2) Get in any major fights with a family member. This is a big one.

3) Refrain from jumping in the pool with my clothes on. The fact that Tate tipped over in his inner tube and got stuck upside down underwater with his feet flailing madly above the surface may have had something to do with this.

4) Refrain from jumping in the pool with my clothes on again. Tate apparently had a vendetta against the pool after it kicked his ass the first time, so he marched right on back in, only this time he had no inner tube. All that chlorine snorted up his nose must have short wired something in his brain.

5) Manage not to make a fool out of myself on the flight down. I'm what some would call a nervous flier. At this point, my family would call it a screaming, bucking, hyperventilating, looking-like-someone-who-just-got-electrocuted flier. It's not pretty. I thought ahead on the flight home though, and started drinking pretty much immediately. The fact that it was only 11 am played no part in my reasoning.

All in all, a successful trip. My mom, sister and I went on a house tour where we got to mingle with a bunch of snooty women who all got some magic, East Coast memo to wear white capri pants, pastel shirts, sweaters with ropes and gold chain things printed on them slung jauntily over their shoulders, and big straw hats. We did not wear any of these things because we're just lowly Midwesterners. I don;t think I impressed any of them when I yelled "Hey, Joanna, look at me!" and opened my mouth to show off my partly masticated brownie. While at the tour, we also experienced what we dubbed "Booty Gate". All the houses made you put on these shoe-condom thingies so we wouldn't track in our mud and germs all over their house. Imagine the uproar when one of the houses ran out of booties. Not a booty to be found. Then the people in charge started trying to get women to give up their booties as they left the house so some of the sad, pathetic little booty-less people could have some.

No one would give up their booties. It was booty madness. Some of these women were about to start throwing chairs or Louis Vuitton purses or their kicky little wedge heels at people in order to get booties. It was pretty much impossible for my sister and I to not start snickering "Give up the booty! Give me booty or give me death! I'll kick your ass for some booty!!" When we finally procured booties for ourselves, we decided that it was everyone for themselves, bitches. Therefore, as we walked out of each houses, we hid the booties under our shirts and steadfastly avoided looking at any of the booty-less masses as we passed. Hey, I don't give up booty to just anyone. I was afraid at any moment I'd turn around and see some Botox-ed, collagened, Lilly Pulitzer-wearing grandma come sprinting towards me intent on getting my booty.

We also went to the beach, swam in the pool, strolled around the town, chased Tate out of the street a million times because it was made of rock and looked just like the sidewalk, and frolicked on a centuries-old Quaker cemetery across the street. We figured the Quakers were a pretty chill group so they would be ok with it.

I would post pictures of the adventures, but something is screwy and the powers that be that live in my computer are not letting me. Bastards. They're all on my Facebook page anyway. And now, since it's been so long since I've blogged, I must stop, for I am spent. I should have stretched first. Hopefully I'm not sore tomorrow.

Ha HA!

Since his surgery a couple weeks ago (no fevers yet...yay!), Tate seems to have a new outlook on life. Mainly, everything is incredibly freaking funny. He wanders around the house all day going "Ha HA!". He sees something humorous on TV? "Ha HA!" Mom drops something on her foot and hops around cursing madly? "Ha HA!" Nora uses her peanut butter and jelly sandwich as hair mousse? "Ha HA!" He puts his underwear on his own head and runs around like a lunatic? "Ha HA! Ha HA!" At least he finds humor in the mundane. Because at this point, underwear-on-head-running-around is a pretty stock activity around here. It's a strange day when that doesn't happen.

He's changing so much lately. All of a sudden he just seems smarter and calmer and...less toddler-ish. I sit back and watch with an odd mixture of pride and mourning. Everyday he surprises me with something new that he knows and everyday I seem to need to fight back tears as I remember the little baby that he was, and is getting farther and farther away from. He likes to play outside by himself now. I watch him as he plays pretend and as he picks up his toys and dresses himself and writes shaky "T"s on his aqua-doodle, and I'm so proud at what he can do, and wonder what new thing he'll be doing tomorrow. I listen to him exclaim "Oh, my GOODNESS!" as he runs away from me and the face of Elmo imprinted on his big-boy undies peeks at me over the back waistband of his shorts. Soon he'll be in preschool, and then I'll turn around and he'll be in grade school and then all of a sudden he'll be graduating high school. Then he'll get married and have kids of his own and I'll be all old and wrinkly and wondering what the hell happened to my bladder control and when I started needing to wear Depends and to take my teeth out at night and put them in a glass by my bed and then I'll be DEAD.

Ah, good times.

Nora, on the other hand, is still my baby. And really lookin' fine these days. This is what happens when she spills something on her dress and it's late enough in the day that there's really no point in putting a clean one on her and neither of us can really be bothered to give a crap about what she looks like.

Now, that's a special looking kid.

And I'm thinking I may have to do something about her hair. Everytime I put pigtails or braids in her hair these days, they last approximately 2.4 seconds before getting savagely, forcibly undone. Then she ends up looking like this for the rest of the day. Imagine a few chunks of slimy crackers and ravioli hanging off the ends and you've got the perfect image of how great she's looking by about 5pm each day.

Nora, aka the reincarnation of John Denver

You're fired.

I long for the days of pigtails. Ah, pigtails. I shall never forget you. Perhaps we'll meet again someday.

RIP Pigtails. 2008-2009.

Prepare for Battle

Ever feel like life is just a series of battles? Battle here, battle there, battle battle everywhere. I battle with my daughter to take a nap without getting a bottle first, I battle with my house to stop barfing up clutter everywhere when my back is turned, and I engage in a battle of wills with my son just about every hour.

We went to a park today and of course Tate very quickly started making me want to pull my hair our. Par for the course. I just wonder what goes on in his little head sometimes, why he gets so frustrated and impatient that he can only express it by hitting or pinching. We try to tell him that it hurts, it's not nice, he'll get a time-out, someone will belt him back harder and we really won't be bothered to care all that much, blah blah BLAH. It doesn't sink in, he hits again, and we leave. It's a finely choreographed routine at this point. Apparently our family isn't much for spontaneity.

Then of course I notice the looks from other people, towards both me and Tate, and I let it affect me more than I should, because really, you think I'd be immune to it at this point. But he's still my son, stinker that he is, and when I can tell that people are disgusted or annoyed by him, it rankles me. I'm his mommy, and even though he drives me to bury my head under a pillow and scream obscenities that would make George Carlin blush, I grew the kid. He's still my baby.

Yes, he hits and yells and makes me wonder sometimes if his head is about to start spinning, but he also kisses his sister's boo-boos and strokes her on the head as she cries. He picks out the best french fry on his plate and gives it to me to eat. He buries his head in my lap and peeks up at me through his lashes, dimples flashing, as he asks "Are you just so proud of me, Mommy? Did I make you happy?" He gets out of bed sometimes at night when he hears me go into my room and asks if he can tuck me in. He's a series of ebbs and flows, rises and falls, smiles and tears, songs and screams. He's not easy, but he's never boring.

And honestly, I like that he's got such strong opinions. I like that he's stubborn and already knows how to stand his ground. He's tough, which often transitions into being naughty, which I'm not so crazy about, but at least he's not going to crumple into a heap and start wailing everytime someone looks at him the wrong way. He's smart. Quick. You really can't hope for more than that. Although there are days where I look at him and wonder if having a nice, dopey kid would be ALL that bad. Just kinda...bumbling along, singing "doo doo doo", getting entranced by a leaf or a rock...I wonder what that would be like, having a kid like that.

But he's not, so we will continue the battle. Someone's gotta back down eventually, right? Now if I could just get my house to stop refusing to stay clean. This battle's gonna be a bitch. Who am I kidding. I've already lost.

Hello World!

I think this may be it. I think the worst is over and Tate is slowly, sloooooowly returning to his human self. The demon may have left the building. I feel like I survived some gigantic nuclear holocaust or something, and am now stepping gingerly out into the sunlight, blinking dazedly and mumbling "Am I ok? Did I make it??" while patting myself down, feeling for bruises and broken bones.

Yeah, I'm what you'd call a survivor. It was a craptastic week but I think, think, we've gotten through the worst of it. I mean, sure we still have at least one daily tantrum, but if those ever stopped I would go right past thinking we survived a nuclear holocaust and go right into thinking we've just been blasted into some alternate universe where up is down and blue is green and people eat ink cartridges for dinner.

The worst part by far has been the kid's breath. Holy crap. They told us it would be a side effect but I kind of forgot about it til the morning he opened his mouth to speak and I swear I saw the flowers outside the window wilt and die. It's like something crawled into his mouth while holding a hot, sweaty penny, stuck poo in it's mouth, and then died while trying to dye it's butt hair with peroxide. I have never smelled such an odor. Thankfully, that seems to be regressing as well. Because for awhile there I'd have to stick my head out of a window and gasp desperately for air anytime he spoke. That didn't work too well while I was driving.

Hopefully this is the end of the fevers. Because if those suckers come back, I'll think I'll actually be hoping for a nuclear holocaust at that point.

Nora's well-timed sickness has abated as well. We of course just had to have a runny-poo-escaping-the-diaper-and-going-all-up-and-down-Mom's-arm episode first, but those are usually to be expected. Now she's running around cheerfully bellowing "Sis? Sat?" ("What's this?" and "What's that?" for those of you not schooled in the fine art of One Year Old-ese.) She also waves madly at anyone who happens to be passing by our house or car or shopping cart while peeping "Hi! HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII! HI HI HI!!!". She finally seems to have gotten over her stranger anxiety and will now beeline towards any male presence within a 2 mile radius, demand to be picked up, and snuggle her head into their neck. We may have to work on that as well. Girl's gotta learn how to exude a little mystery.

Hork.

So Nora keeps waking up in the morning and horking all over. Yesterday I was summoned into her room at 5:30 in the morning by the lovely, melodic sounds of yakking, and was treated to the sight of barf, well...everywhere. Nothing like starting off the day by giving your daughter a bath at 5:45 am and trying not to fall asleep and tip over into the bathtub with her. Although the putrid stench of all the little chunks I was pulling out of her hair really did a good job of keeping me awake.

So really, the only thing I can think of is that the little dear is stashing a flask of rum or something under her mattress and having a little party every night. Which would really upset me. Because really, if there's rum drinking in this house to be done, it should be done by me.

Oh yeah, and because one-year-olds probably shouldn't be drinking rum in the first place.

The demon possession continues around here as well. Like this morning, when I told Tate we were out of bread after the EIGHT peanut butter and jelly sandwiches he had yesterday. Hoo boy. I expected a priest to come slamming through the door, lay his hand on Tate's forehead and start yelling "BACK! Back, ye otherworldly pb&j devil!! BACK!!!" The priest never materialized, though, so I did the next best thing and called Eric on the phone blubbering that he needed to come home from work. At 7:30 am. It didn't happen.

Yogurt-covered raisins were the cure of the day, though. If you're ever trying to get your kid to stop acting like the Devil, try those. I guess they have lots of demon-blocking antioxidants or something. You know, in addition to their sweet sweet chewiness. After the raisins, he was fine. But we're getting really, really bored. This weekend isn't going to be much better. Eric's working 12-hour days, 1:30 am-1:30 pm. Yeah, don't you wish you had those hours?

At least Tate is polite in his aggravation these days. When he gets frustrated, he keeps yelling "Oh my goodness! OH MY GOODNESS!!!!" I don't know where he got the old lady-speak from but it's pretty funny. Well, funny for the first 20 times and then it starts to get a little old. But still, it's better than him yelling "WHAT THE FUCK??" in the middle of the grocery store when he can't get a good hold on his Jell-O square. I have a feeling that would culminate in no more free Jell-O for us.

So Long, Suckers

Do you know how hard it is to try to explain to a three-year-old why he can't have Goldfish crackers? Those things are like cheddar flavor-blasted crack amphibians to this kid. Trying to tell him that they will shred a throat that's still pretty much completely raw is not going over well. All he knows is that he wants Goldfish. Now. Dammit.

It's been a hellish couple of days. I knew it would be, but kind of chose not to dwell on it till the hour of doom approached. Tate's ENT finally suggested getting his tonsils out when we saw him on Friday, and since I decided I would do anything to possibly, perhaps make the fevers of ruin go away, I jumped at the idea. The fevers had to stop.

So we get to the hospital at 6:30 yesterday morning. Tate was pretty chilled out on the drive over and walking into the hospital, but as we were standing in line to register, I watched the expression on his face change to sheer panic as he started to look around. You could see in the dialogue going on in his little brain. "Talking to a bored woman while she gives us paperwork and a bracelet? Check. Weird smell of sick people, rubber gloves and crappy food? Check. Slightly odd pictures of Jesus in the operating room peeking over doctors' shoulders hanging on the walls? CHECK. OH GOD." He started to panic, wailing "I don't LIKE the hosipal! I don't want to BE in the hosipal!!" I knew then that the party had officially started.

We were then checked into our quaint, lovely 10 ft by 10 ft cage of a room surrounded by other little cages and hunkered down to wait. FOREVER. After almost 3 hours of listening to Tate scream that he wanted to go home and watching him chuck shoes at Eric's head, they were finally ready for him. I think the nurses at the desk were relieved when it was finally time to sedate the kid. I kind of expected one of them to slip the anesthesiologist a tenner and whisper to give Tate a heavy load of the real good stuff.

Walking down the hall towards the operating room was extremely difficult. Tate just had this look of sheer confusion and alarm on his face as he held onto Snowy the Monkey with a death grip. We then had to hand him over to Joe the Nurse and watch them walk through the double doors without us. Seeing Tate's face peering over Joe's shoulder at us as the tears started to fall was just about the crappiest thing ever. Seriously. Nothing like knowing your child is terrified and you can't be there to comfort him. Good times. I was a wreck as we sat in the waiting room and listened to two obese old men bellow across the room with each other about their dead wives and various medical complaints.

Luckily, the surgery was over within 15 minutes and they brought him out about a half hour after that. We could hear him crying before we saw him, and when they did bring him through the doors I just about burst into tears myself. Kid looked like he had been ridden hard and put away wet. And of course, there was the IV in his hand. I knew that was going to be a problem, since during our last hospital stay Tate had declared his IV to be his mortal, eternal enemy and set about finding any way to destroy it. I had a feeling this would be "Tate vs IV, vol. 2".

Guess what? I was RIGHT!! Whee for us! We got to spend the next 4 hours trying to keep him from yanking the stupid thing out of his hand and getting whacked in the head for our efforts. He was intent on making that IV suffer for what it had done to him. All of this vengeance-seeking was of course accompanied by window-shattering screams, which I'm going to say was probably not such a good thing to be doing with a throat that had just had stuff carved out of it. After awhile the nurse poked her head in and said "Isn't there anything you can do to get him to stop screaming?" I wanted to reply "Well, yeah, a bunch of things. I just don't feel like doing them. Screaming makes me happy and serene. I FREAKING LOVE IT." I just had to laugh when I thought about how we had dutifully warned the nurses about Tate's Tateness and they all said "Ohhh, don't worry. We've seen it all before, we're used to it, blah blah blah." Right.

So he finally passed out on my lap and slept for a couple hours. As soon as he woke up, the nurse took a look at his throat and said "Okhelooksfinelet'sgetyououtofhereI'llgetthepaperworkberightback" and sprinted out of the room. We were out of there about 4 minutes later.

And now we're home and having epic Goldfish battles every 45 minutes or so. I'm thinking the little guy's probably getting tired of Popsicles after having 4,000 of them in the last 24 hours, but I can't start feeding him soft foods til tomorrow. I'm surprised he hasn't resorted to picking food up off the floor or out of the garbage and hastily stuffing it in his mouth. I mean, he sees Nora doing it all the time, you'd think it would be at the forefront of his mind.

It's been just loads of fun around here. Tantrums at every turn. Puke splattered all over my kitchen floors, cabinets, and refrigerator, courtesy of Nora. She decided she just had to join in the extremely gratifying process of making Mommy's sanity completely perish, and what better way to do that than hork up blueberries all over the floor? Perfect.

But honestly, if doing this makes the fevers stop, I have no regrets or qualms about it. We couldn't keep going on like that...it was taking a huge toll on every one of us. I can take a week or two of pure, unadulterated hell if it's worth it in the end. I may come out of it missing a frontal lobe or something, but it'll be worth it. Those suckers have been removed and disposed of in an undignified fashion. Screw you, tonsils!!

And once again, I'm humbled and blown away by all the fabulous people we know who have offered help, prayers, good thoughts, Popsicles, and wine. Cool people make everything better.

More to Come

As many of you know, our little Tater got his tonsils out today. And surprise, surprise, it was quite an adventure. I've been up for almost 15 hours and am pretty mentally fried. Therefore, you will be getting the story tomorrow. Try not to quiver to death with anticipation.

Hey! GOAT!!

Toddlers do not come with snooze buttons.

Case in point: my two little angels, who have both gotten about 28 fewer hours of sleep this weekend than normal, and who both went to bed way way way WAY later than they should have last night...and who were both awake this morning well before 7:15. And once those suckers start buzzing and warbling and EE-EE-EE-EEing...well, they don't shut off.

What they do have? Some crazy sonar that tells them exactly when Mommy is on her Very. Last. Nerve. Once they get the secret signal that Mommy is thisclose to losing her shit if she hears that whiny little "uh-uh-uh" or the "NOOOOOOO!! I DO IT!!!" one more time, they spring into action.

Tate: "Look Mommy! I bit Nora! Whyyyyyyyy can't I watch TV?? WHYYYYYYY CAN'T I PLAY IN THE CAR??? WHHHHHHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYYYYY CAN'T I POUR MAPLE SYRUP ON THE DOG????????????"

Nora: "HHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEZZZZZZZZZZZEEEEEEEEEEESQUUUUUEEEEEEEEEEE!!!" (Translated: "IF YOU DON'T GIVE ME ANOTHER GOLDFISH CRACKER OR LET ME DRINK OUT OF THE DOG BOWL I'MA THROW THE SMACK DOWN HARDCORE!!!")

Me: CLUNK. Twitch, twitch.

Yeah, so apart from the six thousand moments of crabbiness and general hatred of life by our little cherubs, it was a fun weekend overall. Well, apart from Friday, which sucked. But anyway, we spent the 4th at a couple of different barbecues with friends and neighbors where the kidlets partook in the traditional Fourth activities:

Sparklers. The perfect toy for a 3 year old.

Careening down a hill on a plastic duck that was made for no such careening.

Eating

And...eating. Can you believe it?

We all had a lot of fun. We did miss our friend setting his woods on fire, though...bummer we left before that action. Also, our crazy neighbor didn't call the cops on us this year...first time ever. Although I don't think he was home. We scared him away.

Today we took the kidlets to a petting farm up in Door County. This is where I learned that my daughter is obsessed with goats. Good thing there were 200 of them at this place, so she could go up to each and every one of them, pet them, pull their tail, examine their buttholes, and painstakingly pick up single kernels of corn from the ground and shove them into the goats' mouths. Over and over and over. With every single goat. We tried to interest her in the cows or pigs or kitties, but no. Nora the Goatherd would not stray from her flock. As soon as I'd put her down after walking away from the Goats of Temptation, she would turn around and freakin' book back to them. Fine. Nora loves goats. It is what it is.

Tate was not so endeared to them. He mostly spent our goat-viewing hours going "Hey!! GOAT!!! GOAT! WHAT ARE YOU DOING??" Then he'd see a tree or a leaf and wander off to go check that out. Cause, really, if we're going to drive and hour and pay $16 to show Tate stuff, it may as well be trees, right? He did really like the baby chicks, though. He dug the chicks.

So I took 52 pictures today. And honestly, 26 of them are ones I tried to take of the kids together where they were both looking at the camera, didn't have a hand down their shorts or up their skirts, weren't looking constipated, and weren't in the process of yelling, "Mommy, do you have to go poo??" It was a long process. Here's an incredibly condensed version.

I swear Tate isn't peeing off the side of the wagon.

...um, yeah.

Almost...

So close...

Yesss!!! The ONE AND ONLY picture of the two of them not looking like schlubs together.

It was a good weekend. But I'm ready for a vacation now. I've learned the valuable lesson that there is such a thing as too much quality family time. And I'm riiiiight about there.

Panic

I thought I knew the meaning of panic. Who doesn't? Panic is what you do when you wake up late for one of your finals in college, or when you realize that you accidentally pressed "send" on that bitchy email, or when you realize that your box of wine has but one precious drop left in it and you got a whole lotta sitting on the couch and watching TV yet to do. That's panic, right, people?

Nu-uh. That ain't nothin'.

Panic is when your one-year-old daughter vanishes from your house. Yeah. I'm not kidding. It's when you're standing at the stove, idly shoving ground beef into uncooperative pasta shells and humming the Pajanimals theme when you cock your head to one side, listening to the unusual silence in your house. You know your son is downstairs with his dad in the basement, but you don't hear the usual pitter-patter of your daughter's feet as she trots through the house causing her own personal brand of ruckus. So you go through the house, calling for her and feeling more panicked with each empty room you look in. Then you realize that your son left the door from the house out to the garage propped open, and the garage door is open as well.

Well, that's when a special type of feeling like you're about to crap your pants sets in. So you run outside yelling her name when you hear a panicked shriek that sounds awfully familiar. Then you have that moment of "Call the sheriff! Nora done fell in that there rock quarry!". Never mind that there is no quarry within 600 miles of your house and come to think of it, you're not really sure what a rock quarry is. No, the shriek is due to the fact that your neighbor has scooped your daughter up in her arms so she can deposit her back in your house.

So you run up to your neighbor, who says "Well, I was looking out my window and saw Nora meandering by, and when I didn't see anyone with her, I kinda figured that wasn't how that was supposed to go." She describes how she went outside and picked her up to bring her home and Nora did her usual wig-out that she does when someone she's only seen 200 times in her life picks her up. But, as your neighbor dryly observed "At least she's got the right defense mechanism going."

So you thank your neighbor six billion times while trying to get your heart to slow down, and your neighbor, who has three kids of her own and a very "been there, done that, not a big freaking deal" attitude, consoles you by talking about how her kid once escaped from her house and went into the neighbor's garage and fell asleep in their car.

Then you go home and try not to think about how differently things could have turned out. If she had turned left out of the driveway and not right, and gone towards the cross-street instead of deeper into the cul-de-sac where everyone recognizes her. If your neighbor hadn't happened to see her. If she had cut through someone's back yard into a different street and had swaggered into the bar up the road for a scotch on the rocks. And then you think about what a freaking idiot you must be. How can it take so much brain power to stuff meat into shells? Do you really not notice your daughter strolling right past you into the laundry room and then out the door??

So now not only do I know the true meaning of "panic", I also am pretty familiar with the bona fide definition of "relief". Oh, and "being-so-mad-at-myself-I-want-to-stab-myself-in-the-temple." I got that one down now too.

My little vagabond:

Yeah, I gots to go, people. I gots to roam. Y'all can't tie ME down.

Mommy=Potty?

We had another fun weekend here at the 'bergs. Eric and I are continuing on our quest to turn our kids into the consummate party animals. We're firm believers in the theory that if you party well, then you can do just about anything well. It's a good motto.

Saturday we took the kids to a parade and festival thingie. It was good times, especially since there were about 8 other people at the parade, and all Tate had to do was stand on the curb with his hand extended imperiously and candy would magically come flying through the air at him. That was pretty awesome. It would have been more awesome if we didn't get so much freaking salt-water taffy. Seriously, who eats that stuff? It tastes like salty, watery, chewy...ass. But anyway, we stuffed all the candy into the diaper bag, where Tate promptly forgot about it. Mwa haha. I steal my kid's candy.

Then we went to the festival and went on some rides. I had brief moments where I wondered if putting my child on something that looked like it would fall apart in a slight breeze and was operated by dudes who looked like they could be related to Sloth from Goonies was the smartest idea I've had, but I got over it. You gotta have faith, man. And, see? He loved it.

Ohhhhhh, yeah.

Helllllllp.

Ok, he looks a little petrified there, but honestly, he loved it. They went down that thing like 6 times. Eric had to stop dragging him up the steps by his ankle kicking and screaming after like the third time. Kidding, kidding.

Nora opted out of the rusty, squeaky, creaky, death-defying fun and sat on the grass and ate it. Cause, really, what else is there to do?

Don't even try to tell me this isn't the cutest picture ever. Cause I'll have to cut you.

That night Eric and I went out for date night and had the worst waitress in the history of the world. You know you're in good hands when you ask for a drink menu and she asks you what that is. Apparently she had trouble grasping the concept of drinks themselves, since it took her 25 minutes to bring us ours. I was about to grab something off the table next to us at that point. Ah well. We were sitting outside, sans kids, enjoying ourselves.

Sunday we had people over for a BBQ. It was good times, as BBQs tend to be. See? Here's Tate jumping on the trampoline with his crack peeping out. Really, toddler butt crack and a trampoline are all you need for a successful soiree. Especially when the toddler's swim trunks fall completely down. And then he pees on the trampoline.

Crack is whack.

The kid has issues with shorts lately. I keep the waist loose on them for optimal potty pull-downage, but in Festival the other day we were hurrying across the parking lot with him holding my hand. I noticed he seemed to be walking weird but didn't stop to think much of it. Weirdness is pretty much par for the course with this kid. As I was putting Nora in the cart, I heard someone say "Wow! Do you need help, little guy?" I turned around to see Tate chewing on his finger nonchalantly while his shorts puddled around his feet. Yeah, he was displaying the SpiderMan undies for all the blue-hairs at Festival to see. I wonder how long it would have taken me to notice my kids shorts fell down if someone hadn't said something. I'm thinking awhile, seeing as my powers of observation are pretty weak these days. I'm the mom who didn't notice right away that her daughter was trying to chew on a dog toenail, after all.

And finally, on the subject of pottying, here's a heartwarming story to leave you with. I was sitting on the floor the other day and my dear son came up to me, entwined his arms around my neck and rested his head on my shoulder. I know. Awww. This is what transpired.

Tate: "Mommy?"

Me: "Yes, honey."

Tate: "Can I do something?"

Me: "What would that be, my little pumpkin of sweetness and light?"

Tate: "Can I pee on you?"

Me: "Yeah, I'm gonna say no."

Tate: "But I want to! You can be my potty!"

You know you have your kid's utmost respect and idolatry when he wants to use you as a latrine. It took a long time, folks, but we got there. That's reverence, right there. After a long, drawn-out discussion, we came to an agreement that really, mommies are just so much cooler than toilets and therefore should not be whizzed on. Success.

Whoa

Nora seems to be completely in awe of the fact that she is able to sneeze. It's like she forgets about it in between sneezing bouts. Every time she sneezes, she'll say "WHOA!! Whoa....whoa. Whoa." She's pretty impressed with her ability to project snot from her nose and food from her mouth simultaneously. I don't have the heart to tell her she's not the only one with that talent. We'll save that disappointment for another day. She already had to endure the inhumanity of being informed today that she could not, in fact, eat two-day-old piece of chicken out of the garbage can. And let me tell ya, the day you learn that lesson is a hard day indeed. How can a mother rightfully deny her child the joys of eating a foul chicken carcass and blackened banana peel? Shameful.

Today was difficult for little Nora in more ways than one. I decided to really screw her up and take her to the Y with me and put her in the childcare there while I worked out. Well. She has informed me we will not be doing THAT again. As soon as I handed her over to the lady, she wigged out. No big deal...nothing new there. I walked by the room a few minutes later to peek in the window, and saw her leeched onto one of the childcare givers with her head on her shoulder. Sweet. That's like her favorite position, so I figured she was all good.

Upon my entry to retrieve her, I heard some of the ladies going "Wow, that kid must not like books, huh?". Yeah, apparently when the woman dared to sit down in a chair while holding Nora to read to her, she grabbed the book and pelted it across the room, beaning some poor unsuspecting kid in the melon. I must have forgotten to mention that when Nora is crabby, sitting down while holding her is akin to ripping her eyes out with sporks. Torture. Unforgivable.

Nora then saw me coming and flung herself dramatically onto the floor facedown and sobbed like someone just told her the world ran out of goldfish crackers. I tried to pick her up but she did her patented flop-on-the-floor-like-a-giant-dead-fish move. I swear when I finally did hoist her up, she gave me the death glare. Who knew fourteen-month-olds could shoot daggers with their eyes? Impressive.

Oh well. Perhaps at some point she'll be able to get the indignity of this horrible, loathsome, ungodly day and smile again.

Fun in the Sun. With Some Mortification Thrown in.

So it's finally warm out. It's the middle of June and the temperature rose above 42 degrees a couple days ago for the first time all year. Ok, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but seriously, this past winter was 9 years long. And that's the truth.

So we've been finally able to hang outside. Although the hanging with my kidlets hasn't been quite as pleasant as my poor deluded mind always convinces me it's going to be. Shocking, I know. Tate was sick AGAIN a few days ago, and as we all know, it takes him a good week to fully recover. This recovery week is what I lovingly refer to the "Watch Out, Tate Has Become Possessed by the Devil and all His Minions And Is Determined To Drive Me To Break Out The Tranquilizer Gun" week. We're on day 2. And it's just been loverly.

Last night we went to an outdoor concert with our playgroup. Tate had gone to bed late the night before, woken up early that morning, spent half the afternoon in time-out, smacked Eric on the cheek shortly before leaving, and fell asleep in the car on the way there. Do I really need to continue with the story? I'm sure you can see where this is going. What the hell. I have no shame.

We got there and he spent the first 25 minutes turning on a spigot that of course he found immediately that was by the water fountain. This spigot did not produce a little gentle, affable stream of water. No, when it was turned out, a gush of water would come frantically spewing out in all directions. It was like Niagra Falls. So Tate loved it and felt he should introduce his little sister to the magic of the Water Fountain Geyser, and then she loved it too. When told to stop wasting 500 gallons of water/second, he freaked. So then Eric took him on a walk. I watched as the screaming, flailing, infuriated toddler grew smaller and smaller and realized we would not be there much longer.

We weren't. Watching Tate steal food from other kids and poke me in the stomach and say "FAAAAAAT TUMMY!!!" really lost it's appeal pretty quickly. He got me in the boob once, too, which was kind of weird. So we left, and he loudly protested being strapped in the stroller the entire walk back. Being strapped in was "only for babies!", apparently. It was also only for our diminishing sanity, but he didn't really seem to care about that. So we got into the car, panting and sweating, and Tate declares "Oh, ME, it's chilly out!! Mom, can you believe how chilly it is??". It was 74 degrees. Whatever.

And then today...yeah. We went to a splash pad to let the kids run around. Tate went up to a kid who we didn't know who was easily the size of Hulk Hogan and who had bigger boobs than me (yeah, not hard, I know, but seriously...this kid was like 6), pulled the back of his swim trunks out and put something down them. I'm not kidding. I think it was a handful of grass. I also think I almost died. He then scampered away merrily while the kid gave him a look like "Oh yeah, you BETTER run before I smother you with my man boobs" and I tried to hide behind a tree. I do not know where this kid comes up with this stuff.

Nora, at least, is fairly normal. She's still extremely cuddly and snuggly, which is great most of the time, but man, when it's hot and muggy out...her nuzzling up to me is pretty much the equivalent of a fat sweaty ass sticking to a leather couch. And the ass is only going to get fatter and sweatier and the couch leatherier (yep, I made that word up) as the summer goes on.

Potty training is going awesome. We've made several forays into the big bad outside world with Tate only wearing undies and we've had no accidents. He is currently laying every single pair of undies he owns out on the couch and examining them with his head cocked to one side and tapping his lips with a finger and musing "Hmmm...I think I'll wear Thomas undies now, and then Buzz Lightyear later. I can wear Molly (which is actually Wall-E) ones tomorrow. And then Elmo. Ok, sounds good."

It's hard work, picking out undies.