Our Perfect Misfit Gingerbread House

Always live up to your standards - by lowering them, if necessary. ~Mignon McLaughlin

Isn't that the truth. I was lured into buying a gingerbread house kit this year after seeing the beautiful gingerbread house picture on the box. I thought "Oh, how easy they make this for someone like me!"

Hmmm. Well - turns out our house doesn't look anything like the one on the box. One side of the roof broke as I was holding it in place for the icing to set. So we took it off to make a "cool convertible house". (Good thing I have boys who think those kinds of modifications actually are cool.) We placed candy canes down the sides to make it like a sled because, well, why not? We began decorating the other side of the roof and discovered that it was slipping down. Hurry! Break some candy canes and we'll make a "fence" that just happens to hold up a roof! Ahhh, catastrophe diverted. So we got to decorating the rest of the house and the icing didn't seem to be holding anything in place. Gumdrops, gumballs, and other sugary pieces were slipping and sliding faster and deeper into misfit gingerbread house status.

We were thrilled! Laughing aplenty, renaming the icing "dork glue", licking fingers (and washing hands), and making a deck for the house using the broken roof (after sampling it, of course).

I think it's the most fantastic misfit gingerbread house I have ever laid my baby blues on. And the boys think it's "the best gingerbread house ever" (from Nathan) because "it has a convertible roof" (from Scott). So thanks for the picture, Packaging People. But we did just fine on our own.

Merry Christmas and have a great season doing things your own way!

The Hair That Tickles

You know what I'm talking about. You're dressed and going about the start of your day. You've managed to get some breakfast down your throat, poured a second cup of coffee, fed-dressed-and all around wrangled several miniature people to complete their morning tasks in order to get out the door. What's amazing about all this is that you haven't noticed it yet.

It's when you're faced with the first, and quite possibly only, adult that you will have a chance to talk with in the next 8 hours of your life that you notice it.

That stray hair that got stuck to the inside of your bra. Front and center. That hair that insists on torturing you, no matter which way you wiggle. That hair that you could reach down into your shirt and grab without even looking because it's so annoyingly obvious.

But you can't.

On Demand

On Demand.



I'm sure it seemed like a good idea in the beginning. Just like the idea of single-ply toilet paper or using cooking oil as tanning oil. At some point, it seemed like a good idea and people went for it.


I think my husband and I were some of the last people to finally add that feature to our cable package. The hesitation and delay had to do with the fact that we felt as though we already watched a lot of TV, and we knew a feature like that was only going to add to our butt-time on the couch. The last thing I need is more motivation to be sedentary - chasing kids around all day, trying to keep up with a running schedule, and running a household all offer incentive enough. But we gave in and even went so far as to introduce it to our children.





Here's where my gripe comes in, because I always have a gripe. Now my children believe that everything 0n TV is On Demand. They can't understand why a show they want to watch isn't in their "My Recordings" and they start to become upset. On top of that, given that their generalization skills aren't yet at the adult level, they have also come to believe that everything in their world is/should be On Demand. This is an evil, evil thing, people.


So in the spirit of my children and their confusion regarding how their cable package relates to life, I am going to make my own On Demand list. Ready:


Coffee the moment my eyes open in the morning.


A personal stylist.


The disappearance of 30 pounds from my body.


Long hair.


Short hair.


Blond hair.


A new sassy color of hair.


Vacation.


Nice clothes. Hell, they don't even have to be nice, just something a little stylish.


A house in Italy, Greece, Ireland, Portugal, and Spain - for starters.


The ability to eat brie and roasted garlic cloves spread on crostinis any time I want.


Girls Night Out every weekend.


I think I could go on for a while and I don't want to completely bore any readers I may have - but wouldn't that all be fantastic? (I mean, your own list that I'm sure you were thinking of while reading mine.)


It kind of makes me understand my childrens' point of view a little better. When one area of your life let's you have what you want when you want it, it makes sense to be upset when the rest don't. It points out that instead of getting upset with them and coming up with a sarcastic response as to why something isn't in front of them right after they finished asking for it, I need to be patient and help them understand that this is not the way the real world works. To prepare them for a life that involves working for what you have, appreciating what you have, and being surrounded by things that may initially seem like a good idea.


Like single-ply toilet paper.



Either that, or I need to start throwing more tantrums when I don't get what I want.

I never would have thought that I would prefer to have the stuffed animal.

The carnival.

Carnies. Fried food. Games where 3 ping pong balls will cost you your child's college savings. Or, the better deal, you can get 8 ping pong balls for the price of two children's college savings. Funny money. Stuffed animals. Because one house can never have enough stuffed animals in it.

Good times had by all, no doubt. Who doesn't love a carnival? We took the family last year and the boys had such a great time. They actually remembered the different attractions and games. Nathan won an orange stuffed dog last year which quickly became Lucy's stuffed dog. So his quest this year was to win another orange stuffed dog.

I swear these carnies are smarter than we give them credit for. In retrospect, I realized that they were using a tactic known in my field as Behavior Momentum, loosely defined as an intervention designed to create a momentum of compliance. Basically creating an environment in which one continues with the behavior of spending your children's college funds until you have made it all the way down the line of games without even thinking twice about it, no matter how painful the games or stuffed prizes may be. So here we are, starting at the beginning of the line of games, collecting another closetful of stuffed animals, and working our way down to the end. I catch up to the family at the last station to see the kids throwing balls into fish tanks, some tanks had different colored water inside and that color would determine your prize. Nathan got a ball in!!! Yay Nathan! We were all so excited... and then it happened. The carnie grabs a cup, bends down to a cooler, and begins to get the prize: a freakin' goldfish. My Dad and I look at each other with the same look of "uh-oh". We all look up at the name of the game (which, due to that damned efficient behavioral technique we hadn't done up to this point), and sure enough - it says "Win A Live Fish". Crabapples! Everyone in our party is claiming to not have seen this and I believe them.

Someone thinks of an "out", the weather. It was 105 that day and we still had plenty of carnival-ing to do. So we said - "oh, but it's so hot. It might not survive." Well I'll be damned if those damned carnies are not one step ahead of us, yet again. She hands us a "coupon" to come back at the end of our day and claim it. Nathan is delighted. We are defeated. So we go about our day doing the attractions, eating the food (I finally tried a deep fried Twinkie), and enjoying the mayhem. At the end we're getting ready to depart, thinking we may have a chance at leaving without our live addition to the family, but of course sweet Nathan hasn't forgotten. So we pick up the fish, who received his name immediately, and we bring him home.

He made it the first night. Yay! Maybe we can do this after all! We got food, put him in a nice tank, and flanked the outside of his tank with stuffed goldfish (which probably scared the bejoobies out of the poor guy now that I think about it). Nathan was beaming with pride that he won this little guy and couldn't wait to go to school on Monday and tell his classmates.

Monday, 6:45am: Me - in bed. Nathan - at my bedside "Mom, how do fish sleep? Cuz he's at the top of the bowl on his side and I can't wake him up."

Me - wishing we had been able to just have another stuffed animal instead.

It wasn't the ghetto, forcrissakes.

Katelyn making an important phone call

Climbing truck

Scott enjoying the Spray Dragon

SLUSHIE!!!

Nathan enjoying the Spray Dragon

Crazy bridge

Lion fountain

Ship captains

At the entrance. That poor statue.

We made a family trip to Pixie Woods in Stockton last weekend - one word: AWESOME. Funny thing though, we kept reading reviews about the facility that were submitted by random folks and we repeatedly read such statements like "after you make it through the ghetto" and "you may want to duck as you're driving to get to the entrance". Seriously? I was becoming a little anxious because it is Stockton, after all. I've driven to the Stockton Children's Museum (three words: EVEN MORE AWESOME) plenty of times and know what the area can be like, so I was mentally preparing to see a battleground. I should have snapped pictures so you can see for yourself but I'll try to put you at ease about making your own visit with my words. Ready?

NOT THE GHETTO.

And in case you may still be worried - still not the ghetto.

At least not any ghetto I've seen. I like to think that, given my work history, I have seen my share all over Sacramento and even into Vallejo. Sure the houses were older and could use a little paint. There were chain link fences around most of the homes. The windows had bars over them and looked similar to the housing projects in downtown Sacramento. Don't let it keep you away. The real ghetto to me is when you are driving down the street, no matter what time of day, and there are multiple random groups of people milling around, giving you a hard look when you drive by, and even the occasional pit-bull dog running loose along the street. There might even by a police car with one officer wedging himself between his open door and the car seat telling people to leave the area, only to have these hard-looking boys come closer to him from all angles while he's radio-ing in that he needs back-up. (That's a real story, btw. Let's just say instead of visiting that client I stayed in my car and went right back to the office and counted it as a non-billable "no-show".) That's what I used to see when I worked in the ghetto.

The neighborhood on the (tiny) stretch of road that will lead you to AWESOMENESS had a man, no doubt a father, washing his minivan. A little further down the (tiny) stretch of road was a woman watering her plants. Really people. Just because there's a little dirt, a lot of metal, and a house in need of a paint job here and there - do not call it the ghetto.

Don't be afraid to visit - our family absolutely loved it!

No matter what life is handing you...

Absolutely, hands down, without a doubt - a smile will get you through whatever you are facing. Even a fake one.

Excuse me, I must be in the wrong place.

So school's back in session and we're slowly getting into the groove of it all. At the beginning of each year they have a PTA "Picnic" which we didn't make it to last year for no real reason other than it was a Friday night and, well, we just didn't. After a few days of listening to the boys talk about it upon their return home from school, we decided we would give it a go this year after all - how can we not? They're in 1st grade now, they've got social obligations to keep - appearances to make. We looked over our food choices and noticed that they're asking $5 for a hot dog or hamburger and $10 for a meat sandwich. Um, Ok, so we'll eat at home and then go. Cool.

We arrive around 1/2 way into the shindig, to see almost no familiar faces. Yay us! "So, maybe there's something over there?" (We said that a lot that evening.) We started walking towards what seemed to be the main attraction: the DJ. Alright - this is picking up a little bit, some music, some kids dancing... it might be fun - you know, for kids. Until we realize that the music being played it something you would expect to hear at a 20-something pick up club. Thumpin', bumpin', grindin', shake your thang type music. (Do I sound super old yet?) But really - we're at a K-6 school function - where's We Are Family? Or how about YMCA? Nope, we had a song about going dizzy when you go down. Really? Where am I? And as I'm turning around to see if I accidentally got drunk before leaving the house and was coming out of a blackout - I see a student girl doing a pole dance routine on the tether ball pole. Seriously? With her mom and mom's friend right in front of her, laughing. Did I just see that right? I call my husband's attention, just in case I am drunk. In all the time it took to get his attention, give a casual nod in that direction, have him bear witness to it, and react as I did - she could have been told to stop by a responsible adult. Nope - it was still happening. I was rendered speechless, a very difficult thing to do, and began steering my family away from the "stage". Off to get them each a $3 ice cream. Yay us!

I'm thinking that we'll skip it again next year. At least next time we'll have a legitimate reason.

Today I put my fancy earrings on.

Some days I feel more glamorous than others. As a stay-at-home momma and a child care provider, those days seem few and far between, but they do still happen.

I know that by the end of the day, my clothes are typically marked up with who-knows-what-from-who-knows-who, my face is a little more shiny than it should be, my hair product that was carefully applied in the morning has given up some of it's claimed "Xxxxxtreme" hold, my eyeshadow has collected itself in my eyelid crease, and my lovely perfume has dissipated into the black hole of sweet smells.

But today, I put my fancy earrings on.

I feel pretty.

Love at First School?

These last several days - no, weeks... um, OK months - have been strange ones for me. Maybe it's the third and final addition of Kate to the family that is causing me to have the strongest Mommy Urges that I've ever had. Ever.

As I overheard one of our fellow Kindergarten parents say into his video camera on the first day of school "And there he goes... into the system." It's so crazy that after all these years of being home with them, they are in the mix of the real-world now. Out of my hands for a small portion of each day. I mean sure, we did preschool and all. Two years of it, in fact. That was in our cozy little slice of East Sacramento, with a small population of neighbors that we ran into at the local parks and shops. But now - I mean NOW - it just seems different. It's School. The Big Time.

Now I hear all the stories of the other kids, who does and says what, who hangs around who, who gets into trouble and why (you gotta love a natural-born tattler!), not to mention all the fantastic (ahem!) new words that are flooding into their repertoire. I just don't think there is anything to buffer a parent for the first "crush" of one of their babies. I find myself smiling just thinking about it - so innocent and youthful. I like asking about her and encouraging him to say hello to her (only to be reminded that they are not allowed to talk in class). I fixed his hair up "special" for the third(!) picture day of the year - and for her. But at the same time I feel a little anxious that we've progressed to this phase of life, so fast. I now want to know - who is this girl? Is she good enough to be his first crush? What is her dowry?

What's with it?

How is it that without exposure to guns, bombs, extreme cage-fighting, and other "kill-kill-die" propoganda in our home, my boys still know how to make anything into a weapon? How do they know the noises to make when playing "blast the bad guy" with their toothbrushes? (And why are they better at making these noises than I am?!?!)

I've been so careful (i.e. controlling and sheltering) about access to toys that are traditionally categorized as "aggressive", we do not yet let them watch the blockbuster Spiderman or Pirate movies, and for goodness sake - we make them call water guns "water blasters". So how/why do they do this? There has to be some genetic predisposition for this behavior and their uncanny ability to make the sounds of "violence". On one level, it's amusing. On another, I can't get them to stop. OK - knowing that, I can barely get them to take it down a notch.

I am thankful, however, that it isn't just them. Whew. Talking with other moms I have discovered that almost all boys at this age are experiencing an infatuation with all things burly. As long as I stick to my guns (hmmm, where did that come from?) about what I let them watch, say, and who they play with - I'll let them play like that now and then. They do need to explore.

But they will also always need their limits - and that's when I get my chance to be the best Mommy ever!

The thing about sharing...

"They" say sharing is good, and most of the time I will agree. As a mom of twins, sharing has been a part of my parenting strategy since day one. Literally. Sharing my time with them, sharing the space on my lap, setting up one crib for them to share, sharing toys, food, clothes, attention... Overall, I would say that my boys have done well with the concept.

There are times, however, when sharing might not be so good.

I'm walking through Walmart with Kate hanging off my front in the baby carrier. In front of me is a lady, her mother, and her two unruly children. She looks at me as though I have no idea what I'm in for as she says to me "just wait - she'll do this someday". After I get over the internal thoughts of "oh hell no she won't. I have twin boys who have yet to behave like that", I sweetly let her know that I already have older children and smile as I say "I know how kids can be".

Here's where the too much sharing comes in. She proceeds to tell me her story of wanting more kids, not feeling finished (as her current "lovelies" are pulling bread off the shelves and running up and down the aisles), and how she's going to get her IUD taken out (without informing her husband) so she can have more before it's too late.

I'm sorry, what? Does IUD stand for Information Unwanted Disclosed? Yeah - let's go ahead and get that out.

So now I'm walking a fine line of teaching my boys about sharing and the point at which some sharing might be a smidge too much.

With this blog I will do my best to share updates about the family, photos, and random occurrences that will bring my everyday joy to you. If I cross the line into the world of IUD, let me apologize now.