TJ's Elderly Parents

Christmas morning. My children are being fairly calm and we are taking turns opening gifts. Bill opens up "The Muppet Show: Season 1" and is quite pleased. We all just saw the Muppet Movie in the theater, and the boys are big fans of Beaker and Dr. Bunson Honeydew (because their mother has taught them well). Bill explains to the boys that the DVD is the real TV show, back from when we were kids. TJ commented, "Oh. So it's in black and white, huh?"

How old does he think we are??

This morning, we were doing some cleaning and organizing. In addition to working on the post-Christmas disaster that our house turned into, I was putting fresh sheets on Nolan's bed. He had a serious Pull-Up malfunction at 1 a.m. and his bedding was SOAKED. Dumb Pull-ups. Anyway, it was getting to be lunch time and I asked Sam if he would see if Daddy would get lunch started.

A minute later, a very disgruntled Sam came into Nolan's bedroom. I asked him what was wrong. His reply was totally confusing. "No! Daddy isn't making lunch! Daddy isn't even wearing pants!" Yep. That got my attention. I went out in the hallway, turned the corner in to our bedroom and encountered Bill, minus his pants. All I said was "Where????" and he explained that he had somehow managed to spill mineral spirits all over his jeans. So he took them off.

Bill wasn't painting. Or doing any projects involving mineral spirits. Yet they were all over his pants.

Just in case you were wondering why my boys are so unsusual...

Holiday Desserts

My mother told me I needed to update my blog. So here we are. It's been a little busy the past week or so!

A few days ago, Bill and I were discussing our favorite Christmas treats. We decided we should compile a list. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. Cindy's Cranberry steamed pudding
2. Ellen's coffee cake
3. My mom's fudge
4. Pistachio bread
5. Grandma Knapp's S-cookies
6. Buckeyes
7. My mom's cream cheese bars
8. Frosted Christmas cookies (TJ contributed this to the list)
9. Those cookies with green frosted flakes and cinnamon red hots. Mmmm. Don't eat too many. They make your mouth green.
10. Presbyterian peanuts

Have I meantioned I'd like to lose 10 pounds before we leave for Hawaii? Gee. I wonder how I gained the weight????

Phrases you should never hear at the dinner table

"Take your sock off of the pistachio bread!"

"Put your shirt back on!"

Let's just say Sam wasn't using his best behavior (or any common sense) at dinner tonight.

Achievements, Discoveries, and General Oddities

TJ has taught himself how to snap his fingers. It is one of his more annoying skills to date. He snaps his fingers constantly. It's very difficult to have a conversation with a child who is snap, snap, snapping. It's like he's got a weird tic.

Sam found out the hard way tonight what happens when you open the brand new ketchup bottle and hold it upside down. In the air. And squeeze. And then walk through it.

I hope ketchup comes out of white socks easily.

Nolan picked up a large French fry off his plate tonight and said, "Check this out. It's humongous."

Weirdo. Definitely not your typical three-year-old.

After dinner, Nolan wanted me to open up his new container of dominoes. I told him I wanted him to go potty first. Before it could turn into a power struggle, I balanced the tin of dominoes on my head and told him I would get them down after he went potty. Nolan looked surprised, then serious. He pointed his finger at me and said, "Drop it, Cucumber."

Funny voice mail

When I got back to my desk after lunch on Monday, I had a new voice mail. I played it and heard a small voice say:

"Hi Mommy. The marble came out. It's all gone now. Bye!"

Best news I had all day!

When I was a little boy...

Nolan has show-and-tell tomorrow. He is supposed to bring a Christmas item in to show his friends. He was having a hard time deciding what to bring, so I rattled off several options for him. He settled on my roly-poly Santa. Santa looks a lot like a giant plastic Weeble. He has a bell inside him that jingles when you shake him. Santa is indestructible. I received him as a gift shortly after I was born. So, he is 35 years old and his jingle still works! Trust me, he's been dropped a million times, kicked, and endured various other forms of torture. Not that my siblings and I were intentionally mean to Santa...stuff just happens, you know? So, I wasn't really worried about Nolan bringing an antique toy to school. If I couldn't break him, no one can.

I wanted Nolan to be able to explain to his friends that Santa belongs to Mommy and she's had him since she was a baby, so he is a very special toy. I told him this, and then awhile later asked him if he remembered.

I said, "Who does Santa belong to?" Nolan promptly responded with, "He's yours, Mommy." I nodded and then asked how long I had had Santa. Nolan smiled confidently and said, "You got him when you were just a little boy!"

Close enough.

Why I could never be a stay-at-home mom

A recap of Wednesday, my one day off:

Sam and Nolan are happily playing with Magnetix in the living room, eating Cheeze-its and watching Backyardigans. I’m in here (bedroom) working a little bit. The boys start fighting, so I tell them it’s time to pick up the Magnetix. A minute later Sam comes running in the room and tells me Nolan swallowed a Magnetix marble. I can hear him coughing. I run down the hall and sure enough, Nolan has swallowed a marble. This is NOT the first time he’s done this. I start scolding him, he gags, and pukes up his Cheeze-its. I grabbed his snack bowl just in time to catch the puke. No marble came back, just cracker remains.

Bill comes upstairs, scolds all of us, and tells us the Magnetix are permanently off limits. Sam gets upset because the Magnetix are TJ’s, and he’s not even here to be blamed for this. Bill picks all of them up and puts them on my bed. He also reminds me that I’m in charge of watching for Nolan to pass the marble. Lucky me.

Flash forward to yesterday---Saturday morning. Nolan fills his pants first thing. I have had no luck with getting him to poop on the potty, but right now, that's kind of handy, since I'm looking for a marble. Nolan comes to me and asks me to change him. I said, "Okay! Did you poop out the marble?"

Nolan calmly responds, "Nope. This was just practice."

I couldn't help but laugh. And he was right. No marble yet.

It stinks when your brother is smart

This afternoon, Nolan and Sam were starting to squabble over something and it was turning physical. I heard Nolan shriek, "Stop that! I can't breathe!"

Sam's answer was very calm and very unimpressed. "You can too breathe," he said. "If you couldn't breathe, you couldn't talk."

How do you argue with that? He was right. And oddly enough, his calmness stopped their fighting.

Time to get my hearing checked

Last night at dinner, TJ blurted out the strangest phrase. I'm in the middle of eating my soup and he says, "You have to get a bald raccoon!"

I looked at him and he had a stubborn look on his face. I looked at Bill and he just shook his head and rolled his eyes. I just didn't get it. I asked Bill WHY TJ was talking about a bald raccoon. At this point, Bill started laughing and clarified something for me. Apparently, TJ said, "You HAVE to let me go to Cullen's!"

Oh! Yes. TJ got his first sleepover invitation. It's a Saturday night to a Sunday. We told TJ he could go to the party, but that we would be picking him up at 9:00 pm. For two reasons: 1. Bill and I both know very well that TJ wouldn't make it all night at someone else's house. He struggles when he sleeps at a grandparent's house. There's no way he'd make it at a friend's house. He's too attached to his parents yet. 2. It's a Saturday to a Sunday. We don't spend Sunday mornings playing with friends. We spend it at church, worshiping. I know some people might roll their eyes at our inflexibility, but that's how we were raised, and that's the way our children will be raised.

Maybe it would just be easier if I found him a bald raccoon.

Super Nolan

Nolan was up early this morning, as he had to go to the bathroom. It was shortly after 6:30, but he was wide awake, so when he asked if he could 'stay awake now', I let him stay in the bathroom with me while I put on my make up and fixed my hair. Bill has been sleeping downstairs for the past week, due to a lingering cold he has. At 7:00, he still hadn't made an appearance, so I asked Nolan if he would go downstairs and wake up Daddy for me.

Nolan is still at that awesome stage where he loves being given assignments. He was quite excited about having permission to wake up his father. I told him I would turn on the lights over the stairs before he went downstairs. Nolan promptly shook his head and pointed at his beautiful blue eyes.

"Mama", he said, "I have very bright eyes. I can see in the dark."

Now that's a pretty cool super power. However, just in case he is klutzy like his mother, I turned on the lights for him anyway.

Stating the Obvious

The other day, Nolan had a scratch across his cheek. I couldn't recall him telling me he'd gotten hurt, so I bent down, gently rubbed the scratch and asked, "What happened, Buddy?"

Nolan looked puzzled and asked what I meant. I told him he had a scratch on his face.

Nolan nodded. "Oh", he said. "I scratched it."

And that clears everything up.