George

At this time, it is important that we leave our current narrative to talk about George.

George is a stuffed spider, about 6 inches across, black and furry. Not furry in the traditional sense of furry, but in a nubbly, somewhat realistic black widow sense. He's a very disturbing combination of cute and too realistic and he's Firstborn's favorite pet.

I purchased George along with 23 other Georges from Oriental Trading Co because I was holding our babysitting cooperative's annual Halloween party and I like to have something for the kids to take home. What better than a spider?

I also passed one on to Firstborns favorite classmate as part of a birthday gift at the end of September. The friend loved the spider and named him Fred. So, therefore, Firstborn must like his spider too. He carried him to school and the two boys played with their spiders at recess. Until one day, George fell from Firstborn's pocket.

Now George has a new home or was run over so many times by suburban mini-vans that he is an unrecognizable mass of black fabric on the school playground. We may never know.

Firstborn was heartbroken. He often talked of how much he missed George. One day, while driving home from school with both boys, Firstborn was lamenting the loss of his arachnid friend when Lastborn offered to give up his spider. After all, it was just sitting in the bottom of the toy box. Firstborn sensed a trick and began the questioning process that would uncover the ill will. But there was none. In fact, Lastborn offered to draw Firstborn a new spider if said spider couldn't be found in the bottom of the toybox.

Yes, my heart swelled with pride over the selfless act. And Firstborn was almost pacified.

He named his new friend George too. Not George Two. Just George. No differentiation in the names, but let's be clear, it's not the same George and Firstborn hopes to be reunited with the original George in the future.

This George would have a better life. He would be better cared for and he wasn't going to accompany Firstborn to school. Instead, he would live a protected life that no other stuffed spider had ever lived.

To begin with, Firstborn set up a bed, a ceramic dish he had painted over the summer to hold some of his precious gems. No longer a tray for gems, it would now be George's bed. Along with the bed a soft pencil grip as a pillow, and firstborn's very own blanket. Well, what 's left of it.

You see, Firstborn developed an odd attachment to a certain cotton jersey receiving blanket handed down by his Aunt to him when he was a baby. The white blanket sported a butterfly of flowered material appliqued onto the corner of the blanket.

Once Firstborn was beyond the need of a comforting object, the blanket became a superhero cape, worn around the neck at all times. The blanket/cape gave him the power to fly especially when the breeze in the yard was just right. It gave him the power to leap off of furniture in a single bound. It gave him the power to finish his chicken nuggets.

But it was a hard life for a blanket and eventually, it developed a run in the fabric near the butterfly. The fabric began to disintegrate. I sewed the butterfly back into what was left of the blanket a few times until there just wasn't any blanket left. Firstborn was so heartbroken that we made a deal to keep the butterfly in case we could sew it onto another blanket some day.

That butterfly is now the blanket that Firstborn places on George every night when he puts him to bed in his ceramic dish, with his spider head resting on the pencil grip pillow.

Do you think we have to put a stocking up on the mantel for George?

User manuals have come a long way

Now that I'm back to work as a technical writer, I hope I can do better than this.

the funny thing is that you could probably give that game to a kid and they would have no problem understanding the directions.

100 Points

Firstborn has a project at school. They each have to find $1.00 words. Each letter in the alphabet is assigned a value. In this case, it is their place in the alphabet. They then add up the values of all the letters in a word trying to find one that adds up to exactly 100. Firstborn has been working on this all week. Last night he finally explained the process enough to me that I understood and I explained to DH who immediately caught the fever. Last night at 10:00 as I passed him on my way to bed, he was sitting in front of the TV with a pad on his lap calculating the value of various words. But, of course, he had to come up with an algorithm.

I just asked him if he came up with any. His answer. Yes, but they were not the kind of words he could use. Of course my mind is going in an obvious direction. Is yours?

No. He made up words. His algorithm was to come up with the cumulative cost of common endings like ing, ed, er, and erly. Then he could add up common words and know which ending to put on them to come up with 100 points. His $1.00 words were: mouther -- Which by the way is a word, but I don't think firstborn will be able to bring it in, elementish, customed, and fingerism

Can you find a word worth exactly 100 points. And no, elementish doesn't count.

The assignment

To disguise a picture of a turkey so that he won't be eaten for thanksgiving.

The solution:
The turkey will be disguised as "The Pile of Toys on Lastborn's Floor."

The implementation:
We took a leftover wood tile from the bedroom floor, attached the picture of the turkey, cut out by Lastborn. Attached a base row of Lego plates, and then built up the layers of Lego plates until he had a 3 dimensional pile of Lego attached to the floorboard. The only part of the turkey picture showing is the turkey's eyes.

Quite a successful family project.

I'd take a picture, but the 2 dimensional aspect of the camera would make the effect less impressive.

Unfortunately, Lastborn has a cold today. So he wants me to carry in his artwork.

Happy Halloween

Now this is a scary looking bunch.

They are off trick-or-treating. Two little ninjas and a samurai. It's so warm here I was able to sit on the porch for a while. Unfortunately, brick steps make for cold buts and I had to come back in. The slew of beggars has already started to wane at 7pm. We've already had more than we had all last year. I still have a bag of candy that I haven't even opened. No wonder I have time to blog.

I'll report on the take tomorrow.

Note: It's pretty bad when even the Blogger.com spell checker doesn't know that blog is a real word.

Crown Jewels

Firstborn participated in a pumpkin decorating contest for third graders. His contribution, the St Edward crown was inspired by his love of all things that glitter and shine and can be traded for large sums of money.

The model was this.


Not a bad rendition.

Rare talents

Friday night at our dinner table.

Lastborn is going on about a Spongebob Squarepants episode.
Daddy: Who lives in a pineapple under the sea
Firstborn, Mommy, Daddy:Spongebob Squarepants!
Daddy: Whose porous and yellow... and porous....
Mommy: absorbent and yellow and porous is he
Daddy, Mommy, Firstborn: Spongebob Squarepants.
Pause while Daddy realizes he doesn't know all the words.
Mommy: If nautical nonsense is something you wish
Mommy, Daddy, Firstborn: Spongebob Squarepants!
Mommy: Then drop on the deck and flop like a fish!
Mommy, Daddy, Firstborn: Spongebob Squarepants!
Spongebob Squarepants! Spongebob Squarepants! Spongeboooooob Squarepannnnts!!!!

Can I put this on my resume?

Lastborn was not participating because he thought it was all very weird.

Kindergarten Bully

Yesterday, I picked the boys up after school. There they sat in the gymnasium with their matching lime green backpacks and their tired slumped over posture. But lastborn was sporting a black eye.

I wasn't sure whether to be surprised or not. I wasn't sure whether to assume he had started the fight or had been on the receiving end of the fight either, but I was really curious as to how it had gone down.

Mommy: So how did you get the black eye?
Last born (with a big smile): I don't know
Mommy: You don't know? How could you get a black eye and not know how?
Lastborn: I don't know! My teacher asked me how I got the black eye too, but I don't know.
Mommy: Well you must have done something that hurt. That's quite the black eye.

We walk across the parking lot to the car.

Lastborn: Do you have a mirror? I want to see my black eye.

He climbs into the car and I strap him in. As I do, I notice his hands are covered with black magic marker. You know how kids hands get dirty because they rest them on the paper before the marker dries. My eyes travel up to his face and the thought occurs to me that maybe that's not a black eye after all.

A little spit on the finger and a wipe proves that the black eye was actually marker rubbed from hand to eye. The black marker had mixed with his sweat to form a perfect smudged black to purple to blue. A little on the cheek bone below the eye. A little on the outer lid and a lot on the brow bone above the eye. A practiced stage makeup artist couldn't have done better.

Imagine his teachers surprise at his quick recovery today.

I had been thinking of taking a picture of his first black eye and now I wish I had before I wiped it off. It would have been fun to have a picture of the black eye that wasn't.

Feedback

It seems remcat might have been a bit miffed by my post on Information. She has linked to the post and asked for feedback from her readers. No one is commenting though. So if you have a comment, please feel free to jump over to her blog and discuss.

Sorry if I offended, remcat. It was just information. :-)

Thanks for the link remcat and thanks for reading my posts.

What makes a good blog

If you are not already a dooce reader, check her out. While I usually laugh uproariously at her wacky descriptions of her daughter's behavior or her bathroom humor, it's really the writer that brings me and thousands of readers to her page.

Well today she has done it again and proven she can write on a very serious note. Dooce, you have expressed my feelings so well. While I do have some faith in a higher power, mine was never as strong as my mothers. And this post hits the nail right on the head. Thanks for saying what I hadn't the words to say.

Speaking of High Finance...

I had to share this one.

Tonight DH came home to explain to me why my ATM card had been rejected by two bank machines the previous week. And no, he did not empty out the bank account to get a condo for his mistress. Far less exciting than that, but wait till you hear this...

Apparently, the bank has decided that having every customer carry a check card, an ATM card and a credit card might be a bit of overkill and let's get with the new millennium and make one card do it all! What a concept! So now, they will only let me use my check card to get money from the ATM machines.

How will I cope. My ATM card clearly said ATM on it! I needed this clue to know which of the multitude of cards, all sporting the same emaciated looking soldier (known to the locals as a minute man) to use. Now I will be lost. Is it the blue one or the Burgundy one?

Anyway, they decided to make this change without telling their customers. I wonder how much interest they were able to make on my money that week. Hmmm.

So, to make my check card a fully functioning ATM card, they will be sending out our passwords this week. We have separate passwords you know. Same account, different passwords.

I let DH know in no uncertain terms that I will not be sharing my password with him. No sir! He will not be getting access to my money. I will carry that secret to my grave.

High Finance

On my way to Karate class today, a little voice from the back seat says:
"I'm controlling you so you don't go back to work."
I responded, "You don't want me to go back to work? Why? We would have so much more money if I go back to work." This being reasoning that would work wonders on money obsessed Firstborn.
"Well, you could just go to the bank and get money."
"No I can't. We have to have money in the bank before I can go to the bank and get money."
"Oh. Well then you can go to work for McDonald's." (I'm sure he thinks that would mean that we could eat there every day)
"McDonald's doesn't pay very well though. It wouldn't make us much money."
"Well then work at Burger King!"

Yeah. That'll work.

I'm a chump

Yesterday, after school, I drove the kids past my new place of business. I wanted them to see how close it was to their school as I will be picking them up every day instead of having them take the bus and I want them to realize that this is a logical move not just some arbitrary mean mommy thing.

After we drove past, this conversation ensued:
Mommy: That's where I will be working next month. Isn't it close to school?
Lastborn: You're going to work?
Mommy: Ya. Won't that be fun?
Lastborn: Work is for chumps!

OK. I knew immediately that this must be from a Spongebob episode though I don't remember offhand which one. But still, there was a shock factor having it come from Lastborn's mouth. And somehow, it seems fitting that Lastborn would remember and repeat this phrase. Let's hope this isn't some foreshadowing of his life.

Giving away the ending

So, at this point it is time to admit that I let the kids watch way too much TV to earn me a place in the mommy hall-of-fame. Here's my reasoning:

• Everyone else does it...
• It's DHs fault!
• DH has always watched hours and hours of TV and he's a Genius, I tell you!
• If you ever heard my children talking you would understand why a few hours of silence in this household while they rot their brains away is worth the resultant loss of IQ.
• Only the little on is pudgy. The older one is skinny. So statistically, TV doesn't cause obesity. I know, small sample size, but I'm trying to justify here, not give real data.

So all this is background to the story. Yesterday, I had much to do. So did DH. Children are not too conducive to getting things done. Luckily, Firstborn was off playing with next-door-neighbor-boy. So we just had to account for Lastborn.

Perfect! DH had rented Mega Blocks Dragons Fire & Ice, the movie from Blockbuster. A perfect day all around. We heard not a word from him as he watched the movie over and over again.

Later that evening, we enticed Firstborn through his dinner and bath with a promise of watching the movie. The plan was that Lastborn would be able to take a bath and then join the rest of us for the remainder of the movie, since Lastborn had already watched it a few times.

As soon as Lastborn entered the room, he started talking about what would happen next in the movie. A very annoying habit both boys have. They tend to watch just about everything multiple times. And they want to let the world know how much they know about each show they have watched. We are constantly on Firstborn's case about not doing this and now Lastborn finally had a chance to participate in spoiling the ending.

Firstborn: Stop telling me what's going to happen!

Lastborn: I'm just giving you some information!

Ah! They are both born engineers. Information. That rules all. If you're giving information, it does not matter how annoying you are. It's information!

I understand that in the deep south, as long as you bless someone or invoke the name of Jesus, you can get away with some of the most horrible insults. For example:

"She is an ugly little girl, bless her soul."

"Why bless you, you don't think you will actually find a husband do you?"

"In Jesus' name, I hope she dies an ugly death."

These are all considered quite mannerly in the deep south. Well up here in MIT country, information will save. If you have just insulted someone and need to save face, just claim information. As in:

My, You're looking fat today.

When the person responds with a look of shock and revulsion, simply reply:

Hey, It's just information. Do with it what you will.

He is Redeemed!

Lastborn announced that he has been invited to lunch with the principal at school. This, not for the expected Lastborn behavior, but for reading more books than most of the kids in his K class this summer (Which I find hard to believe as we lost steam halfway through).

So, if we can get good behavior from him through the entire lunch, maybe the principal will forget the previous introduction to Lastborn and somehow begin to think that this precious blue-eyed boy is pure goodness and light.

It's tough work being a marked man in Kindergarten.

Flattery will get you everywhere II

Lastborn: Daddy! Your wife is a great cook!
Daddy: Lastborn! Your Mommy is a great cook!
Lastborn: Daddy! Your wife *is* my Mommy.

What an illuminating bit of information.

And all this was over a couple of pieces of toast. Too bad my more intricate cooking efforts are always greeted with a long drawn out YUUUUK!

First Impressions

Lastborn had a Kindergarten open house today at school. They marched all the kids and parents into the cafeteria to welcome us. The principal stood up first to talk and began her speech.

Sitting in the front of the room, Lastborn decides to shout, "Who are *you*?" as if to say "why are you wasting my time?"

It's not that he is terribly disrespectful or that he meant to be a smart alec, he just has a tendency to put the emPHAsis on the wrong sylLAble.

The principal smiled and responded well to his comment, but I know he's a marked man.

A great first day.

Top 10 list

Paperback Writer often provides top 10 lists on her blog. Never have any of them been as entertaining as this one though.

10 great ways to waste time from bashing haggis, to making paper airplanes to an electronic kaleidoscope.

Lost a tooth

Firstborn lost a tooth last night at the bible school closing ceremony. I thought he was all done losing teeth. God knows when he will really be done.

So this brought back one of the funny stories from the days when I didn't have a blog to share.

When Firstborn was losing his first teeth, he was very impressed with the idea of the tooth fairy and the fact that no one had ever seen her. Firstborn decided that if he could catch the tooth fairy, he would become famous and be the richest boy in the world, and since Firstborn is very interested in being the richest person in the world, this seemed like a very good idea.

So, on a night where he had just lost a tooth, he sat at the dining room table covering a piece of paper with green marker. The entire piece was green. I asked him what he was making, and the flood gates opened.

He said, "I'm making a trap for the tooth fairy. I'm going to cover this with glue stick and then put my tooth on it and then the tooth fairy is going to come to get my tooth and she will get stuck to the pillow and not be able to fly away and I will wake up and she will be there and I will catch her and I will become rich and famous!"

Understand that in those days, Firstborn had the ability to talk while breathing in. So, all of this was said at a very rapid pace with no pause for us to set him straight.

Oh what the heck. We allowed him to carry the sticky sheet of green-colored paper up to his bed, place the tooth on it and then place his pillow over the fairy trap. The glue stick glue is completely washable after all.

The next morning, Firstborn was somewhat disappointed to find 3 foreign coins under his pillow. Knowing that Firstborn was a collector of coins, the tooth fairy liked to bring them for him instead of the traditional American ones.

When I asked Firstborn how his plot unfolded, he had totally moved on. He told me that the glue must have dried before she got there, but he had a better plan for next time he lost a tooth.

Next time, he was going to get a bottle, fill the bottom with glue that doesn't dry and then drop the tooth in. She would have to go into the bottle to get the tooth, but she would never be able to come out. Later in the day, he had even devised some trip wire corking system in his mind so that if the glue didn't work, he would have a back up plan.

At this point, I felt it was important to remind him that the tooth fairy doesn't bring money to little boys who scheme.

Baby's got Blue Eyes

Yesterday, someone asked Lastborn where he got those beautiful blue eyes.

He responded with some disgust "I've always had them."

I need to teach him to say "Walmart!"

California Barking Spiders

On the way home from Bible School today, I mentioned to the kids that Daddy would be back from California tomorrow.

Firstborn: Yay! Do you think he will bring any barking spiders home with him?

Mom: Something tells me he will

Lastborn: Barking Spiders!!! Will we get to look at them?

Mom: I think he'll keep them hidden but I'm sure you will be able to hear them bark quite often.

By now, both boys are laughing so hard that it's a good thing they have seat belts to hold them in.

Hooray for the fart joke. At least it keeps them from fighting for a few minutes.

PS. My spell check does not like the word Fart. Excuse me while I check my Merrium Webster. I was under the distinct impression that fart is indeed a word that one can use in Scrabble. So why does this spell check not accept it? Hmmmmm.

Learn to last 5 to 10 minutes longer in bed

This was the title of a junk mail I received this afternoon and it made me laugh a bit. First of all, I don't think they planned on sending it to a woman, because frankly, we don't often have that problem.

Secondly, it struck me how that presents a totally different picture to me now that I have kids than it would have pre-kids. Just how are they proposing I last 5 to 10 minutes longer in bed? Isn't that something I do every day when awakened by the childish voice saying "Can I get up now, Mommy?" Just 10 more minutes. Puleeeese.

Something tells me that if I were to click on that link I would not end up finding solutions to get my kids to sleep longer.

Tee Hee.

Yee Haw!!!

36 days till school starts!!!!!

Too much TV

Recently on Nick, there has been a commercial wherein a young teen with great bravado and a bright pink shirt announces, "Pink! It's the new black." Lastborn has always liked that commercial. I never thought he really understood the message of don't follow what everyone else tells you is cool. But yesterday, he surprised me.

Lastborn has earned his camouflage belt in Tae Kwon Do. This is the 4th level of belt in the system we are following and it brings him to the intermediate level. He never talks about how far he wants to go in Tae Kwon Do. He never talks about wanting to be a black belt, but he has been impressed with the fact that he is at the intermediate level now and he has always been impressed with the camo color.

So in class (there were only 4 kids there) he holds the ends of his belt and announces,
"Camo! It's the new black."

The instructors were all shocked as was I. But even more so when he started to boss the kids around in class as if he were the black belt teaching the class. He obviously completely gets the message of the commercial as well as the structure of the do jong.

As I say in so many of these posts, should I be scared?

Bugs!!!

Lastborn: Mommy, there's a bug in the house!
Mom: Ok, I'll get it.
Lastborn: Maybe it's an earpig.
Mom: An earpig? You mean an earwig?
Lastborn: yah. An earwig.
Firstborn: What's an earwig?
Mom: come look at it before I pick it up.
She turns over the partially squished bug that's still wiggling it's legs.
Mom: See? It has pinchers on one end. It moves really fast.
Lastborn: And it never dies!

Inventive spelling

Driving firstborn to school. There's only 2.5 days left!!!

He's quizzing me on mineral facts. A very rude habbit. I've tried to explain to him that not everybody knows the painful details of minerals, crystals and other forms of compacted dirt, but he persists in asking me questions and then laughing because I don't know the answer. So I decided to make my point by turning the tables.

Mom: So Firstborn. How do you spell Mississippi?

Firstborn: M-i-s-s-i ....
No! It's M-R-S-dot um.



I couldn't figure out where he thought the R came from until he stuck that dot in. Being from MA we often get misled as to whether there is an R in a word or not. But Mrs.-ippi! Perfect!

Air conditioners and cold spells

So this past week, we had a heat wave. Not just any heat wave. This one came complete with 99.9999999% humidity. I ran my mother's group annual yard sale fundraiser this weekend and we all almost died. No one has peed in the northeast in days because we are all sweating too much.

So when I got home after said yard sale on Saturday, I begged and pleaded with DH to install the air conditioner. Frankly, I don't think anyone wants to be around either me or my children in this type of weather. So that was probably incentive enough.

DH warned me that if he put in the air conditioners we would get a cool spell. After 7 days of heat and humidity in mid June, it's hard to imagine what cold would be.

But now I know. Because today, it got up to 75! I need to run upstairs and put on some long pants now....

Knock, Knock

Firstborn: Mommy! Knock, Knock (he's already giggling)
Mom: Who's there (clutching her coffee).
Firstborn: Lapis!
Mom: Lapis who? (not that I don't know)
Firstborn: Lapis Lazuli! It's a rock that I heard about last year when I was first learning about gems alksdjf lkj fl ;adjf al ljdf kj lj asjf lfj a;jf ; ;jf lkdfj a;hooij l;ajdf ;how lkdjf;j ...

The rest is just a blur. I was holding my first cup of coffee. I'm not sure an entire summer of trivial facts on rocks, gems, minerals, crystals, stalactites and stalagmites, coal, jet, amber and other formations of dirt is bearable.

An imitation of what they see

Lastborn: "If I was my Star Wars book, where would I be?"

This is the acceptable replacement for

"Mommy, Where is my Star Wars book?"

To which, he would hear,

"I don't know. I'm not responsible for your Stars Wars Book."

It's amazing how the things we say seem so trivial until we hear them out of the mouths of our kids, over and over again.

10 things to do this summer

Stolen from Charmaine with her permission of course.

1. Spend time at the sprinkler park.

2. Take a family vacation.

4. Read with the kids every day.

5. Find some rocks!

6. Teach Lastborn how to write his name.

7. Call friends I haven't been in touch with.

9. Do science experiments with Firstborn.

10. Get the kids to take more responsibility around the house.

Flattery will get you everywhere

Sitting in the car waiting for Firstborn to be released from school. I was eating an apple. Lastborn sat next to me watching the apple as it went into my mouth. I took a bite and moved the apple away and his eyes followed it.

Lastborn: "I'm still hungry,"
Mom: "You just had Burger King. How can you be hungry?"
Lastborn: "But I am. Give me some apple."

Mom: "Oh, but I can't. You see, this apple has poison in it. Anyone under 18 who eats this apple will go to sleep for a million years."
Lastborn: "No they won't! You're just joking."
Mom: "Yes. Yes they will."
Lastborn: "But I'm 4."
Mom: "Yes, and 4 is less than 18. So you will go to sleep for a million years and only a kiss from a beautiful princess will wake you up once you go to sleep."


Lastborn: "You mean like you?"

Here. Have a bite of my apple. Anything you want, kid. It's yours.

Kitty Fun

Love it. Stolen from Gemmak who stole it from someone else.

Cat catching.

Give them an audience

Firstborn and I stopped by an educational bookstore the other day. He had received a coupon to select two free items from their treasure chest and I figured what a great place to get a teacher gift.

As I wandered around the store familiarizing myself with what they carried (for future reference), he babbled away in my ear. I can't even remember what the topic was. Gems and minerals no doubt since that is his topic of the month.

I made eye contact with one of the store owners and she smiled supportively.

So now, it's time to retrieve said gifts from the treasure box. Firstborn must first supply some information because they are going to put his name in a drawing. He dutifully spells our last name (he'll be doing that for the rest of his life). Then she asks him if he knows his phone number.

"Well I don't have a phone yet, but my Mommy's is..."
The store owners were taken with this response and so struck up a conversation with him.

He touched on, how much he hates school but he is learning grammar though it isn't very hard, he didn't know any of it when he started school but he gets good grades because mommy says he has a good memory, but the math and spelling are really easy and he loves to read.

I don't think he had taken a breath at all at this point.

So then he has to show them his muscles. The whole time they are having a great laugh at his effervescence. His rate of speech is sometimes amazing.

So then he tells them about his exercise routine and how Daddy taught him these exercises and he does a hundred a day and his daddy does two hundred every day. With full demonstrations of the above exercises.

Then we move on to his Tae Kwon Do school how it is called ATA and they have an association in Europe called UTA and another school system somewhere else in the world called WTF. But Daddy takes Krav Maga which isn't Tae Kwon Do and isn't part of ATA but he goes to the ATA school to learn Krav Maga. The whole time these women are getting quite the kick out of his performance.

So I have to finally wrap him up, but he's still talking on the way out of the store. The ladies say goodbye to him and tell him to come back soon and he responds,

"My mother says she's going to make me a T-shirt that says don't ask me a question unless you have time to listen to my answer."

Maybe I should get going on that T-shirt.

Star Wars Returns

The parents at Tae Kwon Do are already amused with Lastborn's antics. Many is the time I have wanted to crawl under my chair and hide so they wouldn't all look at me laughing when he is putting on a performance. So this Wednesday, was not as bad as it could have been had I not been so conditioned to his behavior.

The object of the game:

• One child was the tagger.
• The game progresses like tag, but when a child is tagged, they are supposed to jump into a fighting stance and count to ten.
• Once they complete their count, they go back to the game.
• The teacher lets each tagger go for a few minutes and then picks another tagger.

Probably a bit much for the 3, 4 and 5 year olds in the class.

So she picks a tagger and they all start running. Eddie begins to sing the Darth Vader's theme at the top of his lungs while weilding an imaginary light sabre. At one point, he even stops running in front of a heavy bag and begins to slash it fiercly with said imaginary light sabre. The whole time doot-doot-doing the Darth Vader theme.

When purple belt boy completes his turn, teacher asks him to pick the next tagger and of course, he picks Lastborn. The kids start running. Eddie starts running still humming the Darth Vader theme. The imaginary light sabre is still in his hand. He finally figures out (due to much shouting and coaching) that he is the tagger and begins to chase his first victim. But he doesn't tag in a conventional way, because Lastborn is not a conventional child. No. Instead, he strikes the child with his imaginary light sabre. In the hustle, the child tips over and falls on he floor. Then Lastborn stands over him delivering repeated strokes with the imaginary light sabre while the parents in the parent's room are damaging their ribs laughing.

It was a sight. The whole thing had a rather maniacle tone.

Now, flash back to many months ago when this same teacher was lecturing the class on the life skill of the month, discipline. She figured that instead of defining the word for them, she would interact with the group of 3, 4, and 5 year olds and give them a chance to shine. So she asked the group of 15 preschoolers, "Do any of you know what the word discipline means?" There were many answers, none quite on the mark, like being nice to my sister, helping my mother. The teacher was able to redirect them into something useful like being nice to my sister even when she isn't very nice to me or helping my mother with chores even when I would rather watch TV. But Lastborn (remember unconventional) stumped her. His response?

"I won't kill anyone?"

Is there anywhere I can hide?

So all this is rushing back to me as my child stands over this poor 4 year old boy singing doot-doot-do, doot-do-do, doot-do-do.

Drama

I picked up Lastborn from school at lunchtime today and asked him my daily question.

Mom: So, did you have fun today?
Lastborn: No. It was a day of humiliation.
Mom: Really?
Lastborn: yah.
So we got into the car and I began to question just what he meant by that, considering that I was surprised that he could even say the word.

Mom: So what happened that was so humiliating?
Lastborn: My teacher pasted my picture on a flower and showed it to everybody. It was so humiliating.
Mom: Was it? So did you tell your teacher that this bothered you?
Lastborn: No. But I told her to turn the flower over so that no one could see it.

Next, I explained the difference between humiliation and embarrassment to him.

Mom: So. Do you think maybe you were embarrassed instead of humiliated?
Lastborn: No. I was humiliated.

Wow. So I wonder how much therapy for this will be.

Na na na na na

A conversation recently in our home.

Mother: Firstborn! I did 75 front kicks in one minute in Karate today!

Firstborn: Ya? But I bet they were amateur kicks.

Mother: Amature kicks? Of course they were not amateur kicks. They were beautiful, perfect kicks.

Father: Laughing

Firtborn: No they weren't. They were amateur kicks.

Father: Lastborn was there. What do you think, Lastborn? Were they amateur kicks?

Lastborn: Ya. They were really amateur kicks.

All the boys in the family laugh.

I bet I can kick their butts!

Up all night?

On Tuesday, we celebrated Lastborn's birthday by giving him two little star wars action figures. He was in heaven. In fact, the euphoria of receiving these coveted toys was enough to keep him up all night.

At 4 am, I awoke to hear him humming this tune: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/recs/radio/krex/-/track/B0002YCVJC002010/ref=pd_krex_dp_t/102-1719494-7492148#

Sibling Rivalry

This weekend we visited G'Pa in NY state. We were out at a diner for lunch. Firstborn had just finished a tall stack of pancakes and the waitress was giving him kudos for the great job. G'Pa responded that Firstborn was quite a fine young man.

Never letting big brother be the center of attention, Lastborn responded,

"He's not young and he's not a man either!"

Be careful what you ask them.

Shopping with Lastborn today. In our 3 hours of shopping, he kept rearranging himself for some reason. I kept asking him if he had to go potty and he kept saying no.

So finally, as we left Bed Bath & Beyond, I asked him, then why do you keep touching your penis?

You may guess his response:

1) Because I really do have to go potty.
2) Because secretly, I want to be a woman, and this thing is just bothering me.
3) Because I like to, in a sweet babyish voice.

As he finished this declaration, I looked up to see a young guy sitting on a park bench outside the store. He was grinning ear to ear and his shoulders were shaking convulsively.

Things I never expected to say to my kids

No. You can't take a gun to church!


and


Please take your head out of the mailbox!

Art posts?

I suppose art is just as good as quotes. So here is one of lastborn's. He announced that he was going to draw Darth Vader. Pretty good, I think.

Don't I clean enough?

The other day, I was doing some spring cleaning. Specifically, running the floor scrubber over my kitchen and play room floors. I task I detest. And I admit freely that since my mother's death in November, I have not been cleaning as much as I should. I now know the importance of spending loving hours with each other. Life is just so short and all that.

Lastborn calls down the stairs.

Are we having friends over?

Me: Yes. Why? Because I'm cleaning?

Lastborn: Ya.

Thinking, "What a clever fellow," I continue on with my home upheaval. Later, we bring firstborn back from school. He enters the house, drops his books and says:

"Are we having a playdate?"

It's not that they're clever, it's that I'm a slob.

guyless?

Lastborn is sitting in his carseat on the way to pick up firstborn. He has brought along the star wars cruiser, anakin skywalker and obe wan kenobe. Anakin fell from his grasp as soon as the car started, then he lost obe wan.

Mommy! I lost obe wan. I'm guyless!

This is a big improvement over last month's insistence that the younger version of obe wan was named six-o-wan. Really. He called him six-o-wan kenobe.

Intro

OK. So kids do say the darndest things. So, I decided I had to start writing them down.

The stars of the show are firstborn (12/11/96) and lastborn (04/18/00). I could call him secondborn, but lastborn seems to convey so much more about his personality.

Hope you enjoy these quotes and I look forward to presenting them to future wives when the time comes.