A Conversation at my House

- I walk in the front door after visiting my grandmother for a few hours-

Brad: You will never believe what your son did.
Estee: Try me.
B: He started screaming in his bedroom, so I ran in there to see what was wrong. He was pointing to his nose and screaming like crazy.
E: I can see where this is going.
B: He had something stuck up his nose. I seriously thought I was going to have to take him to the ER. I could not get it out.
E: Ok, how did you get it out? Tweezers?
B: Hey, I didn't think about tweezers. No, I just pinched his nose and squeezed down.
E: Um, like when you want to get the toothpaste that is at the end of the tube? You toothpaste-d our son?

- pause -

B: Was that bad?
E: Well, no, obviously you got it out, right? What was it?
B: That's the worst part!! It was a purple bead from Breuklyn's princess tiara!
E: Why is that the worst part?
B: Well, it isn't very manly.
E: I'm sorry, but what? I think that sticking something up your nose is very manly, as in only a man, generally speaking, would stick something up his nose. I never stuck anything up my nose. It isn't really a girl thing to do.

- thinks for something clever to say, and fails -

B: Well, it could have at least been a marble, or a lima bean or something.
E: I'm sure he won't let down next time, dear.

When We Grow Up...

Breuklyn: Mom, when I grow up I want to play in a music group. Or maybe I will be an astronaut.

Me: Oh really? When I was little I wanted to be an astronaut too.

Breuklyn: Really?? Well, you can go to the moon with me. We can live up there, just me and you.

Me: Sounds good to me. When shall we leave?

Maddux: Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!!!!! When I growed up I want to be a Viking!!

Me: Well, it's important to have goals.

My New Favorite Joke...

My poor children were held captive in the car for a very long time today as I ran about a million and three errands. Between having lunch with Brad, going to the bank, picking up a birthday present for Breuklyn's Pre-K friend and dropping off a check at my Realtor's office, the kids got a little tired of the view from the backseat.

After singing Old MacDonald has a Farm a gazillion times, I was desperate for something to entertain the kids. (If anyone could clue me in as to the sound that a giraffe makes, I would greatly appreciate it. We sit in silence because we have no idea. ... and on this farm he had a giraffe e-i-e-i-o... with an -ummmm- here and a -silence- here, here a -?-, there a -who the heck knows- e-i-e-i-o!!!)

Somewhere between that house that has every single blow-up yard Christmas decoration thing known to man and me leaving Paizlee's bottle on top of the car and then driving off, I remembered one of my favorite jokes from when I would drive my mom crazy from the backseat. I taught it to the kids, and then we called Groggee and Aunt Murray to tell them the new bestest joke ever. Would you like to hear it? Don't lie... you know you want to.

Me: I ONE the sandbox
Breuklyn: I TWO the sandbox
M: I THREE the sandbox
B: I FOUR the sandbox
M: I FIVE the sandbox
B: I SIX the sandbox
M: I SEVEN the sandbox
B: I EIGHT the sandbox... I ATE the sandbox, bwahhahahahahahahahahahaha

Yes, yes... I know it isn't the most amazing joke, but I have the sense of humor of a three-year-old and I love it. It allowed for at least 15 miles of unstoppable laughter, and that is the goal, right?

Hello? Santa?

Brad and I have some very different ideas when it comes to parenting. We try to look at this in a positive way. For example, this week when Maddux snagged a pink marker from my scrapbooking stuff and colored in his new (formerly) khaki corduroys, Brad and I had different reactions. My initial reaction was to hang him upside down from the ceiling and never, ever buy him new clothing. Ever. Never ever. Brad's reaction was to laugh and explain to Maddux that markers are for paper, not clothing. However, if Breuklyn and Maddux are teasing each other for the millionth time in 5 minutes and both are screaming at the top of their lungs, it is Brad who is about to lose his mind. He will be plotting how we can auction them off on Ebay, so then it is my turn to go into Breuklyn's room and explain to her, calmly, that if they can't play nicely together that we are going to have a yard sale with all of their toys. We do whatever it takes to keep our blood pressure within relatively normal limits. It's a process.

Yesterday Brad came up with an absolutely ingenious parenting strategy that worked wonders with our children. He said that if they didn't stop running around the house like maniacs that he would call Santa Claus and tell him that he shouldn't come to our house. The kids stopped running... for about 10 minutes. When the kids came racing back into the living room, Brad jumped up and grabbed the phone. As the kids froze mid-sprint, my eyes widened in anticipation as to where this was going to go. He dialed about 15 numbers (I guess the North Pole is long distance, right?) and the conversation went like this,

Brad: Hello?? Mrs. Claus? Hi! How are you?

-listens and nods his head-

B: How is Santa? Has he been feeling well? Yes, I am sure that you are very busy this time of year.

-he continues talking to himself-

B: No, that's ok! If he is busy, then I won't bother him. I was just hoping to speak to him for a moment.

-did I mention that my children are whispering, "please daddy!! don't tell him that we were being mean... we'll be good... we promise!!!!" in the background?-

B: Well, if he gets a chance, he can call me back. You have caller ID, right? Yes? Great, then you have my number.

The kids are thrilled that Brad didn't rat them out to Santa and I swear that they behaved themselves for the rest of the evening. Every 15 minutes they would swing through the living room to check and see if Santa had called back, but they were quiet and extremely polite. Brad was very proud of himself. I don't know what we will do when Christmas is over, do you think the Easter Bunny has this much pull?

Ahhhh-CCHHHOOOO!

Breuklyn: Mom, can we sleep with that thing on that blows air?

Me: Huh? The thing that.... oh! The humidifier? Why? You aren't really sick anymore.

Breuklyn: Yes, we are. We have energies.

Me: You have energies? Um...

Breuklyn: Yes. Energies. We are sneezing and our eyes are itchy.

Me: Oh! Allergies. I'm fairly certain that you'll survive.

You can't argue with truth.

Breuklyn is four going on fourteen. I am convinced. This child has more attitude in her little finger than poor Brad has in his whole body. Proof? Are you asking for proof? Oh yeah, I've got proof...

Let me set the scene... We are sitting at dinner and Brad is, once again, teasing Breuklyn for some unknown reason. Also, imagine Maddux yelling YEAH after everything Breuklyn says.

Brad: You are such a drama queen.

Breuklyn: No way! You are the drama queen!

Brad: Oh yeah? Well, you are a silly little girl

Breuklyn: No way! You are a big weird man!

- I swear that was Maddux giggling, not me. No, not me at all. It is not nice to call Brad a weird man, so I certainly did not giggle. -

Brad: (Looking somewhat perplexed) Well... you... um... you watch too much TV... yeah!

Breuklyn: And you have a stinky mommy!

- bwahahahahahahahahahahah... -

Brad: (Shocked, has nothing to say)

Me: (Trying not to laugh. Unsuccessfully trying not to laugh) Breuklyn. That isn't very nice. You tell daddy that you are sorry. (Turning to Brad...) That's what happens when you tease your daughter.

Watch out for those tomatoes!

Last night we had some wicked storms. They came absolutely out of nowhere, but after having 15 days this month of 100+ weather, we were grateful for some rain. (I heard this statistic on the news this morning, I promise I am not Rainman in training who is capable of keeping track of random facts) Brad's friend, Craig, called this morning to ask if we had any damage to our house. Huh? I know it was storming, but as far as I can tell, no rooms are missing or anything. Apparently, there was a tornado last night. Crazy.

When we went grocery shopping, we saw the damage done by the tornado. It tore the roofs of of the Days Inn and Ramada and toppled the signs (those huge signs that you can see from the interstate) of the Super 8 and the Huddle House. Praise the lord that the Starbucks was spared. :)

Breuklyn was busy singing, "I need to fly away and live with the giraffes!" in the back seat and wasn't much interested in the conversation that Brad and I were having until she saw all of the destruction. "What happened??" she asks incredulously. "Well... You know how we had all of those storms last night?" I was trying to make it kid-friendly information. "Sometimes the wind gets so strong that it makes a tornado and ..." "WHAT??!!??" she yells, "Tomatoes did this? I can't believe it!! How many tomatoes? I don't like tomatoes!!"

So... yes... please watch out for those tomatoes.

No one wins anything by sticking fingers up their nose.

Maddux is obsessed with his nose. It isn't pretty.

His nose was the first body part that he was capable of correctly identifying. He would walk around pointing at the middle of his face repeating, "My nose" over and over and over again. He found great amusement in sneaking up on Brad (after he had fallen asleep on the couch) and grabbing onto Brad's nose. This would lead to Brad jumping up off the couch in sheer horror because he had no clue what was happening. He was not amused. (I was.) I, personally, believe that Maddux loves his nose because it contains the word "no." This is, however, just a theory.

Maddux has long mastered a very long list of words, can count to ten and can name all of the body parts. Yet, he is still obsessed with his nose. When I went in to rescue him from his crib this morning (he flat out refuses to sleep in the big boy bed) he was sitting there with his two index fingers jammed into his nostrils and was trying to blow them out. He grinned at me. "Please don't do that," I said. "But Mommy!" he countered, "I lub my nose!" We spent a long time washing his hands before breakfast.

He tried to teach Breuklyn this game, but she has blissfully pointed out that it isn't a game. "You can't win," she says. This is a very good point. No one wins anything by sticking fingers up their nose. I think this would make an excellent bumper sticker.

My Forte

This sloppy little girl (don't you love the untucked shirt?) is me. Wasn't I adorable? I think that my favorite part of the layout is the journaling of all the future things that I would become. My proudest moment? Why, the Johnson Elementary School Spelling Bee, of course!! One of my shining moments, and I have the dictionary and thesaurus that I won in 1990 to prove it. I also had a trophy, but that was dismantled in high school when I was too cool to spell correctly.

Since I was the winner, I was just lucky enough to move on to the next round, which included the winners from the other local elementary schools. I had a blue booklet that contained many, many words that I had no intention of ever using, let alone spelling. My parents were such good sports about it, my dad especially. He was my biggest spelling fan. He would quiz me during dinner. "Spell assimilate," he would say. I would sit up straight and start out, "A-S-S..." and then collapse in giggles that I had spelled ass. I was quite the classy 5th grader, what can I say.

When the big day arrived my dad borrowed a video camera because, clearly, this was a monumental event and took me to my spelling debut. As the number of spellers dwindled, I gained a little confidence. I was excited. When it was my turn again, my fateful word was forte. My dad zoomed in on the video camera. "Forte? Could you use it in sentence, please?" The announcer guy says, "Spelling has always been my forte." I stared blankly at him. "Um... F-O-R...um...T-A-Y. Forte." Well, I was close. Or maybe not.

As I burst into very loud tears of anguish, my dad hastily turned off the camera and tried to get me to calm down. On the way home he looked over at me and says, "Estee. You do play a musical instrument." My glasses were all fogged over, so I couldn't see him, but I mumbled, "Yeah... so?" "Well... forte is a term that is written all over your sheet music." Oh.

The best part of me causing a scene at the Spelling Bee was that I assumed that no one that I knew would ever see it. I hadn't counted on it being shown on the local education channel a million and four times so that everyone that I had ever met could watch me not spell forte. Ugh.

I find that as the days go on I am capable of spelling fewer and fewer words correctly. Maybe I need to bust out that dictionary...

A Conversation with Breuklyn

Breuklyn: Mommy, are you crazy?

Me: Not that I am aware of. Ask me again in a few days.

B: Are you dizzy?

M: Um... no. Why in the world are you asking these bizarre questions?

B: Are you the boss?

M: In a very un-Tony Soprano kind of way, yes. I get to be the boss.

B: Are you the bus?

M: Am I Jerome Bettis? No. Am I your main source of transportation? Yes. I am really not fond of being referred to as a bus, though. How about a Mini Cooper?


And then she just wandered off. Just walked away and left me wondering if I really am the boss.

Fu#&y Pants and Big Boy Beds

Maddux is at a crazy, crazy age. His vocabulary amazes me and I am loving the crazy words that he comes up with. He has new pajamas. On these pajamas are some very cool iguanas, which he calls "guanas." He loves his iguana pjs more than any other piece of clothing that I force him into. Last night, he came dancing out of his room in his iguana pjs and said, "Mommy! These are so fu#&y!! I love my fu#&y pants!" Brad and I looked at each other in horror. Breuklyn pipes up, "No, Maddux! Those are FUNKY pants, not fu#&y pants!!" "OH!" he says, "My new funky pants!!" and the dancing and celebrating continued as Brad and I continued to stare at each other.

In other Maddux news, I put together his new bed today. Since I have caught him twice trying to pole vault out of the crib, it is time for the "big boy" bed. He was NOT happy about this. Two seconds after depositing him safe and sound into his new bed for naptime, and leaving him with lots of reassuring thoughts, I found him trailing after me in the living room. After being placed back in bed three more times, he finally fell asleep. Finally. Of course I have checked on him a million times and of course I had to take a picture. Now if Paizlee would take a nap, I might actually get something accomplished!