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!"