Mail time!!!

I was in the kitchen fixing dinner when heard Max screaming. Aaron came running down the hall with Max following close behind.

Screaming.

Now this in itself really isn't that unusual. Aaron enjoys teasing Max, and Max enjoys screaming when Aaron teases him.
Usually in this situation, Max will come running to Mommy for a hug, but not this time. Aaron ran past me, and when Max got to me, I scooped him up to give him a hug and make him feel better but Max wiggled free and continued to chase Aaron back down the hall.

Screaming.

Then Brielle came into the room "I can tell you what happened" she said "Max wanted to play mail box. He sang the "Mail time" song to Aaron, but before he finished Aaron just left the room. Max just wanted him to take the mail out of his head."

Max pretends to be "Mailbox" from Blue's clues. He bends his head over and then we pretend to take the mail out of his head.

So, when Aaron came running back through the kitchen, with Max in close pursuit, DH grabbed Aaron and held him. Max stood in front of Aaron and bent his head while I struggled to get Aaron's hands and make him touch Max's head.
"There" I said "Aaron has his mail."

Max stopped crying for a moment until Aaron threw his arms in the air and ran back down the hall saying "No, I didn't get my mail, I just threw it on the ground."
Max "picks up" Aaron's imaginary mail and runs after him screaming "GET YOUR MAIL! GET YOUR MAIL! GET YOUR MAIL!................"

My kids are so weird.

Missing teeth and chipmunk cheeks

CJ had his wisdom teeth out on Friday. We got to the Oral surgeon's office at noon, the time the surgery was scheduled.
We waited 45 minutes for the nurse to come and take him back to the doctor.
I read about 3 magazines.
45 minutes later, the nurse came out to tell us that the surgery right before his had some unexpected complications and took over an hour longer than they expected, and they would be starting on CJ pretty soon.

I read another magazine.

15 minutes later, the nurse came back to tell us that they had started CJ's surgery.
I read two more magazines.

Now let me change the subject for a moment. Apparently, of late, the majority of reading that I've been doing has been online, I know this because........
I read an article, and really wanted to leave a comment, but you can't do that with a magazine. It really drove me crazy, because I had some really good things to add to this article, yet there was no comment box at the bottom for me to type in.
Oh well.
Also, when reading a real magazine, you are unable to copy and paste when you find a recipe that you would like to try.

I can't tell you how annoying this was!

Back to the waiting room...........
I read 3 more magazines, then start copying recipes from the magazines onto receipts I found in the bottom of my purse. This took forever because I've become accustomed to typing, and writing things out manually is a pain.
Sometime this week, I will be making a zucchini and asparagus frittata.

I had now read all of the magazines that interested, or at least halfway interested me. I pick up a copy of Teen Vogue.
I will NEVER allow my daughter to have a subscription to this magazine! The models consisted of scantily clad underweight onery faced girls in suggestive poses.

I start re reading the magazines that I've already read.

One and a half hours later, the nurse came back to tell us that they were almost done and that they would be bringing us back to the recovery room in a while, but first, she took us to another waiting room where we would meet with the doctor.

And you know what that means?



NEW MAGAZINES!!!


I read a few before the doctor came in to tell us how the surgery went. Apparently, CJ did great, but things were more complicated than he originally thought, and it took much longer than anticipated.

We went to see CJ in recovery, and he was rather groggy. We led him out to the car and took him home.

He's been doing great. (but then what kid wouldn't be doing great on a steady diet of ice cream, pudding and freshly baked bread?)

He does, however, have a bit of swelling.

Max looked at him and said "You haves chubby cheeks!"
CJ said "Why do you think I have chubby cheeks?"
Max: "Because you goed to the doctor and he did make your cheeks chubby. I think he putted marshmallows in them."

Earlier today, CJ found an old video of himself when he was about 10 months old.

He had the same cheeks.

Singing Sea Life and other oddities

Watch this fun video!!!
(Seriously, watch it all the way to the end, you won't be disappointed)




























Earworm : A term for a portion of a song or other musical material that repeats compulsively within one's mind, known colloquially as "music being stuck in one's head".









You're welcome.

Teeth, cookie monsters and WORD VERIFICATION WEDNESDAY!!!

GOOD NEWS!!!

Our insurance company and Oral surgeon's office have communicated sufficiently to allow CJ to have his surgery on Friday!

Yipee!

The only problem is that the insurance still says that they won't pay for the anesthesia.

We told CJ that if he gets all of his homework done this week, we will pay for him to have anesthesia during the surgery.

Change of subject.

Yesterday, Max walked into the room sobbing. Tears were running down his cheeks, and he was clutching a box of girl scout cookies.
"What's wrong?" I ask.
He turned the box upside down to show me that it was empty, and then sobbed "I was COOKIE HUNGRY, and they ATE ALL THE COOKIES!!!"

Poor Max.

(I have to admit that I was feeling a bit bad about it myself)

I had one box of cookies left, so I went to my super secret hiding place and got the Thin Mints.
The other kids (who seem to have some sort of sixth sense when it comes to knowing when a box of cookies is open) came into the room. I told Max that we needed to share.

So Max, my little cookie monster, held the box of cookies and tried to keep the kids from eating any until I told him that he wouldn't get any cookies unless he sharedvery graciously handed out the cookies to his siblings, one at a time, while eating as many as he could in between.
He looked really cute with all the chocolate smeared all over his face.

Another change of subject.

Today is Wednesday, and time again to come up with some definitions for those pesky word verification codes.

If you're new here, here's how to play.
Go to the comment box, read the word verification code and leave a comment giving me your definition for the word.

Play as often as you wish. The more the better!

If you don't like the word you got, refresh the page until you get one that you like.
Check back often to read what others have come up with.

Have fun!

I'm not winking at you. Really, I'm not.

My left eye has been twitching.

For several weeks.

Twitch..............twitch.........twitch, twitch.................twitch.

It's driving me a little crazy.

Twitch, twitch.

So, I did what every hypochondriac normal person would do, and googled "eye twitch"

What I thought might be something serious resulting in me getting a nice long rest in the hospital is probably nothing serious at all.

twitch.....twitch....twitchy twitch.

Most of the websites I visited said basically the same thing. Eye twitching is most likely caused by stress, fatigue and lack of sleep. Three things that have been a big part of my life in the last few weeks.

Twitchity twitch.

Still, I don't think that my eye twitch has anything to do with my sleep deprivation. I'm pretty sure it was caused by this.


Seriously, this is DRIVING ME CRAZY!!!

PLEASE! MAKE IT STOP!!!!!



twitch.

Adding it up

Number of times I hit the snooze button this morning - 3
Number of times I had to ask kids to get out of bed - 3
Number of children I took to swimming lessons - 2
Number of minutes late to swimming lessons - 3
Number of times Max coughed while at swimming lessons - 892
Number of comments I got from other moms whenever Max coughed - 15
Number of tissues used to wipe Max's nose while at swimming lessons - 3
Number of stickers given to my kids by the greeter at Wal-Mart - 3
Number of times Max coughed while at Wal-Mart - 892
Number of times Max wiped his nose on his sleeve because I was out of tissues - 18
Number of Lifesavers given to Max in an attempt to calm the cough - 14
Number of times I told the kids that I was not going to buy the box of cookies at Wal-Mart - 892
Number of Wal-Mart cashiers who commented on Max's cough - 1
Number of times I asked the kids to load the dishwasher - 5
Number of times I loaded the dishwasher - 1
Number of times I asked CJ if he was sure that he packed everything that he needed for Scout camp tonight - 5
Number of items CJ forgot to pack for Scout camp - 2
Number of times I drove home from the Scout leader's house to retrieve said items - 1
Number of times I embarrassed my teenage son by giving him a hug in front of his friends - 1
Number of times this month I've taken Max to the doctor only to be told that there's nothing wrong with him - 2
Number of times Max coughed in the doctor's office - 0
Number of times Max coughed on the way home from the doctor's office 892
Number of co-pays given to the doctor's office in the last month - 2
Number of Strep cultures that have come back negative - 2
Number of Cold Stone's "Gotta have it" size ice creams I could have had with the money I spent on doctor visit co-pays this month - 7-9 (depending on the mix ins)
Number of times today Aaron tried to bring a potato bug home as a pet - 2
Number of times Aaron brought a potato bug into the car - 1
Number of times I told Aaron to put the potato bug back where it came from - 2
Number of complaints I got about what I was fixing for dinner - 1
Number of slices of cheese Max ate for dinner - 6
Number of things other than cheese that Max ate for dinner - 0
Number of times Max coughed during dinner - 892
Number of shoes found under my kitchen counter - 7
Number of times I've asked for the shoes to be put away - 892
Number of weeks the kids have been off track from school - 2
Number of weeks left until the kids go back to school - 1
Number of times this week I asked the kids to stop fighting - 892
Number of boxes of Girl Scout cookies I have hidden - 3
Number of things that were on today's to-do list - 12
Number of things on today's to-do list that I accomplished - 0
Number of items I did during the day that I added to my to-do list so I could cross them off - 5
Number of items cluttering up the floor of the basement - 94
Number of times I've tripped over all the stuff on the floor in the basement - 94
Number of times I've yelled kindly asked for the items on the floor of the basement to be put away - 94
Number of minutes I will be able to sleep in tomorrow morning - 0
Number of children who will be expected to help with yardwork tomorrow - 4
Number of children who will complain about helping with yardwork - 3
Number of times I will actually feel bad about making the kids help with the yardwork - 0
Number of weeds that need to be cleared out of the flower beds - 876,464,346,354,432,431
Number of times I wished that I had bought the cookies at Wal-Mart - 13
Number of times I almost stopped writing this post because it seemed too lame - 4
Number of times I decided I didn't care how lame the post was, and hit the publish button anyway - 1

It's Wednesday again

Yes friends, it's been a whole week and now it's time for everybody's favorite game,

Word Verification Wednesday!

Where we take something as annoying as typing those silly word verification codes and turn it into a fun game!

It's like we're taking lemons and making lemonade!


Here are some examples from last week.

cheds: "What's the matter with dis chihuahua? It CHEDS!! Chihuahuas aren't supposed to CHED!!"

Gasce - a fancy way to say you just farted.

dionsubi - if Brad Pitt and Madonna ever adopt a child together, I bet that would be his name.

Copap--when you and a girl friend have your GYN appointments together!

You guys are funny!

Remember, play as many times as you wish. If you get a word you don't like, just refresh the page until you get one that you're happy with.

Have Fun!!

Hot hands, noisy milk and armpits

Tonight before Max got his pajamas on, he wanted a drink of milk.

I got a clean sippy cup out of the dishwasher, but I couldn't find a suitable lid anywhere in the kitchen. (and by suitable, I mean NOT bumpy, which is how Max describes the sippy cup lids which he has chewed on)
Finally, I looked in the refrigerator and found a sippy cup from earlier in the day which still had about 1/2" of milk left in it.

"Hey Max" I say "Here's some milk."
He looked at it, turned up his nose and said "No. I need new milk."

I explained to him that this milk was exactly the same age as the milk in the jug, but no, he wanted a new sippy cup with new milk.
I said "I'll just fill it up the rest of the way with more milk."
"NO! You not can put that milk in the old milk!"

I opened the lid and showed him "Look, the milk is fine, drink this and I'll fill it up again."
"NO! I NOT NEED THAT MILK! DUMP IT! I NEED NEW MILK!"
I then explained to him that I would not be pouring him any more milk until he drank what was already in the cup.

He gave me a grouchy look.

I put the gallon of milk back in the refrigerator.

"I NEED THE MILK! I NEED THE MILK!!"

I once more told him that all he needed to do was drink the small amount of milk, and I would give him some more.

He lifted the sippy cup to his mouth and said...


GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.


GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!


GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!

"SEE! I NOT CAN DRINK THIS MILK!! IT MAKES SOUNDS!!"

"Max, just drink it."

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!

GRRRRRRRRRRRR!!

"IT MAKING SOUNDS! THE MILK IS ALSO MAKING SOUNDS WHEN I TRY AND DRINK IT!

GRRRRRRRRRRRRR!! GRRRRRRRRRRR!! GRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!

I am now unsuccessfully trying to suppress my laughter. (Seriously, you would laugh too if you heard milk growling at your son) This was only making Max be even grouchier.
"No Max, you will not get any more milk until you finish what is in the sippy cup."

He gave me a rather defiant look and said "I need my armpits to drink the milk"

He then picked up the oven mitts that were sitting on the kitchen counter, put them on his hands, then picked up the sippy cup.
"My hot hands are making the milk make sounds. My armpits will make the milk not be noisy."

He then proceeded to drink the milk which was now mysteriously quiet.

He sat the cup down and said "See, my armpits did make the milk quiet."

I poured the sippy cup full of milk and gave it back to him, and asked "What do you mean, your armpits made the milk quiet?"
He held up his hands, still wearing the blue oven mitts and said "SEE! MY ARMPITS!!"

Armpits,................ oven mitts...........

I guess I can see how he got the two mixed up.




Seriously, never a dull moment.................. never a dull moment.

Therapy Thursday

The year..........2029

The place..........Therapists office

Dr. Therapist: "So CJ, at our last appointment, we spent quite a bit of time discussing your childhood memory of how your mother told you that zucchini tasted like chocolate."

CJ: "Yes, it turned out to be a very traumatic experience for me."

Dr. Therapist: "Were you able to have a dialog with her about this in the last week?"

CJ: "Yes, I called her and we had a long discussion. Apparently, she was just trying to get me to eat something green. I didn't like green food."

Dr. Therapist: "Was this a useful conversation? Were you able to find closure?"

CJ: "Yes, I think I've finally worked my way through this subject. Zucchini tastes like zucchini and chocolate tastes like chocolate. No confusion anymore. I think that I've learned that it's time to let it go and leave this incident in the past. Mom was only trying to do something which she felt was in my best interest. I won't bring it up with her again."

Dr. Therapist: "Good! Good! Excellent CJ, you've made tremendous progress. Now last week at the end of our session, you mentioned something about these flashbacks you've been having. Should we discuss this further and see how you feel about it?"

CJ: "Yes, I think I'm finally ready to talk about it. I believe the flashback comes from an experience I had when I was about two years old. My mom took me to the store to buy some shoes. Apparently, she usually had a hard time finding shoes to fit my chubby feet."

Dr. Therapist: "So your flashback is about shoes?

CJ: "More about this particular shopping trip. I never liked shoe shopping, so when we got to the shoe department at Target, I was in a bad mood."

Dr. Therapist: "Did you not like shoes?"

CJ: "No, I liked shoes, in fact, I rarely took them off. My parents used to take my shoes off of me when they felt I was misbehaving."

Dr. Therapist: "They took your shoes off as a punishment? APPALLING! What things could you have done that would be so terrible that your parents felt they needed to remove your shoes?""

CJ: "They were always saying stuff like ........."CJ, stop jumping on the couch or I'll take your shoes off." or "CJ get your seatbelt on or we're going to take your shoes off" and "CJ, if you let go of my hand in this parking lot, I'm going to take your shoes off.........."

Dr. Therapist: "Hmmmmmmm.......... interesting. I think we may need to examine this more closely, but I think we'll discuss it later. For now let's get back to the shoe department at Target. What happened?"

CJ: "Mom found a pair of shoes that she thought were my size and then wrestled my shoes off."

Dr. Therapist: "And how did this make you feel?"

CJ: "I wasn't very happy, but I dealt with it."

Dr. Therapist: "So it wasn't the act of taking off your shoes that led to the trauma?"

CJ: "No.........No........... it was .........when .........Mom put the new shoes on me.........................."

Cr. Therapist: "Go on, what happened?"

CJ: " She tried to force the shoe on my foot. The shoe was kind of narrow through the arch, and I guess she thought that was why it wasn't going on."

Dr. Therapist: "Was the shoe too small?"

CJ: "No. It was a larger size than the shoes I had been wearing. Mom kept pushing my foot into the shoe. It just wasn't going in! She just kept trying and trying.........and trying......................................(sob)"

Dr. Therapist: "Go on CJ, take your time. Talk when you're ready, I know this type of trauma can be very difficult to talk about after being suppressed for so many years."

CJ: (taking a deep breath) "I'm OK, I can get through this. Mom kept pushing and shoving my foot into the shoe."

Dr. Therapist: "Did it ever go in?"

CJ: "Well, Mom finally took the shoe off and looked............. inside........................."

Dr. Therapist: "Was there something wrong with the shoe?"

CJ: "There was a big wad of tissue paper in the toe, that's why my foot wasn't going in."

Dr. Therapist: "How terrible for you! I honestly can't see how you lived through the trauma! Have you discussed this with your mother?"

CJ: "Oh, I've discussed it all right. I've brought it up on numerous occasions. At first, Mom acted like she couldn't remember the incident, and after that, she would just laugh when I would talk about it."

Dr. Therapist: "Did she ever apologize?"

CJ: "Well, yes, she has said that she's sorry multiple times, and told me that she felt really bad about what happened, but I still can't seem to get over it."

Dr. Therapist: "Our time is nearly over for today. I think we've had some major breakthroughs this session. This week I'd like you to call your mother and discuss this shoe incident as one more item on the growing list of things that she did to traumatize you and scar you for life."

CJ: "Thank you Dr. Therapist, I'll do that."

Dr. Therapist: "You're welcome CJ, I'll see you next week. When you get to the waiting room could you please have my receptionist send in my next patient? The poor guy, if you think you had it bad, you should hear his story. He keeps having a recurring nightmare about Elmo wearing a pink fairy princess costume."

Word verification Wednesday

HEY!!



IT'S WEDNESDAY!!


Word verification Wednesday.




Ready,




Set,




DEFINE!

A great way to really irritate a 3 year old boy

Dressing Elmo TMX in a fairy princess costume.




Because apparently...................


"ELMO NOT IS A GIRL!!! SHE IS ALSO A BOY!!

OUCH!!!

Today, started out as a really nice day.
It lasted that way until about 8:00 pm when Max accidentally head butted me right in the mouth giving me a swollen lip.
Then within a few minutes, another one of my children (who prefers to remain nameless) accidentally knocked this off the doorway just as I was walking through it.




It landed right on top of my head!

THIS REALLY HURT!

I'm pretty sure I have a skull fracture. I think my family needs to wait on me and bring me food all weekend.
What do you think?

Preschool Show and Tell

When Aaron was three, he brought some ....................unusual items for show and tell.

While most kids were bringing things like a sea shell that their grandma brought back from Hawaii, the stuffed Mickey mouse they just got on their latest trip to Disneyland or the toy they got in their Happy meal yesterday, Aaron was a bit more creative with what he wanted to share with the class.

Like the time he brought the Christmas gift given to him by his siblings.

A whoopee cushion.

He LOVED that whoopee cushion. It was yellow and covered in duct tape. (Were you aware that you can fix a leak in a whoopee cushion with duct tape? It totally works)

Anyway, after weeks of begging, and against my better judgement, I let Aaron take the whoopee cushion to show and tell. I couldn't even imagine what his teacher would think about it.

That afternoon when I picked Aaron up from school, I asked him how show and tell went. "What did your teacher think about your whoopee cushion?"

"She blowed it up and sat on it!!"

(seriously, what a cool teacher is she?!)

Apparently, the whoopee cushion was a big hit because the teacher sat on it several times and as Aaron put it "The kids all thinked it was funny!"

Another odd thing I remember him taking to show and tell was his own invention.

"The foil ball"

Aaron liked to get the box of aluminum foil, tear off a sheet and then crumple it into a ball. (And just in case you're wondering, the correct three year old's pronunciation of the foil ball was "foyow baw.")

Aaron took a few of his favorite foil balls to school for show and tell, and as an added bonus, he even decided to take a sheet of plain foil to show everyone how to crumple it up so they could make their own foil ball at home.

(he really did this. Seriously, I couldn't make this stuff up)

Fast forward to this week. Max took these to show and tell.

Aaron made them for him, and he has been playing with them for the last week.

Max calls them "Spaghetti Monsters"

Can you guess what they really are?

The good news, the bad news and WORD VERIFICATION WEDNESDAY!!

The good news is that I currently have a ton of work to do for my business :0)

The bad news is that this has made it so that I have less time for blogging :0(

The good news is that Max is feeling better :0)

The bad news is that he gave all of his germs to me :0(

The good news is that due to my cold, now when I sing, I can hit all the low notes :0)

The bad news is that I still can't sing :0(

The good news is that today I got everything done on my "to do" list :0)

The bad news is that it was yesterday's list :0)

*******************************************************************

Ever since Max was a baby we've called him by his nickname "Pookers. Over the years, we've created several different versions of his nickname, for example Pookydoo, Pookerama, Pooks-a-doodle, Pookernoodle, Pooker-doodle-doo, The Pookernator...........

You get the picture.

Sometimes when we don't want Max to know what we're talking about, we will spell words. Unfortunately, Max has caught on to this and can recognize certain words we spell such as "Max" and "nap" will figure out what I'm saying and then "I NOT TAKE A NAP! I ALSO NOT SLEEPY!!! MY EYES ARE ALSO OPEN!!!!
For a while, we used code words such as "siesta" instead of nap. The kid caught on to that too.

So last week, I started using pig latin.

Today, I needed to run a quick errand and didn't want Max to freak out when he found out I was leaving without him so I asked Brielle to "Atch way the id kay while I oh gay to the ore stay."

Max heard this and said....

"I NOT AN IDKAY!! I'm POOKERAMA!! POOKERAMA!! POOKERAAAAAAAMMMMAAA!!!

I wonder how long it would take him to figure out "Ubbi dubbi"*

**********************************************************************

On another note, do you think that coughing can count as a cardio workout?

**********************************************************************


And now for the game you've all been waiting for!

WORD VERIFICATION WEDNESDAY!!!

Go to the comment form, look at the word verification code, come up with a definition for it and type it in the comment box!
It's fun!!

I was disappointed last week that nobody wanted to answer my essay question about the wind speed velocity of an African swallow vs a European swallow.

(sigh)

It's OK. I don't feel too bad.

really.

Today, if you don't feel like defining a WV word, you may leave a comment in pig latin. (however, if anyone leaves a comment in ubbi dubbi, I will not take responsibility for the mocking that is sure to ensue) (I might even participate in said mocking) (In fact, I will probably be the instigator of the mocking)

Ready, Set, GO!




* If you don't recognize this language, then you are just way. Too. Young.