Fist Full of Frosting

| Mommakisses

This shouldn’t happen for another 5 months… but it did.

After the boys had their tutoring this morning I told the birthday boy, G, he could choose where we get lunch. “Me?” Yes, you, my son… Where would a five year old pick??? Ah, yes, those golden arches. Ever popular with the wee ones. I figured, if it’s gotta be, let’s go to one with a play area and let ’em run.

And I called a friend (we’ll call her GR, so as to not be confused with G) to witness the madness with me.

K, sitting in a high chair for the first time… she is working on sitting up now… was very ready for lunch… couldn’t get that squash and turkey blend to her fast enough. Which can be tough when you are trying to get three others to settle down and eat. GR was helping feed K, when J came to sit beside her… and somewhere in there K was ready for more… we quickly discovered how fast she is getting… we were suddenly bathed in squash and turkey from the jar she tried to grab that ended on the floor.

On with lunch. And as a special treat, I brought in some cup cakes for G’s birthday. K was not very happy about being left out of the goodness. I did let her taste, but to have your own, well, that doesn’t happen until your first birthday…

S is such a good big sister… she felt K needed more, and also gave her a big finger full… No, S, she’s had enough… Well, so, did S… and while I turned to say something (it’s lost to me now) to G, S set that cup cake down… and K grabbed it… in a blink she had big fists full of frosting, in her mouth! Oh well… so much for the first birthday…

I bet ol’ Ronald was never so glad to bid someone goodbye.

And her Kung Fu name shall be “Fist Full of Frosting”

Good Night Moon

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I love how my kids think! On the way home tonight J and G were looking at the moon. It was full (or very close), low and orange. The conversation was very excited and fast paced. Why was the moon orange? What if the moon was orange tonight and the sun white in the morning? Wasn’t it just half a moon last week?

And then there was this gem from G: “What if God made the moon orange ‘cuz He knows it’s my birthday tomorrow?”

“So then it’s God’s gift to you?”

“Yeah! That’s cool! Thank you God! Thank you God for that great gift!”

Really… Thank you God for that great gift called G! Happy Birthday, little Booga Boo!

I would have taken a picture, but the moon disappeared by the time we got home, so this one from the water park on Monday will have to do… it pretty much sums G up anyway 😉

Sweet girl

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I am not a mom who likes kids sleeping in our room. Not at any age. At K’s age or even younger, I would be afraid I would smush them in the night. However, once they are old enough to get out of their bed, an element of control is lost.

G would, like clock work, get up and come into our room and snuggle up at 6:30 every morning for about a year, maybe 18 months. He started at about 2 years old. I thought he would never stop. He still has mornings where he wants to cuddle, but we sit on the couch while we both wake up… and that’s not every morning any more either.

S is not like clock work… it’s very hit or miss. Sometimes I think it depends on the pjs she has on. And the time she crawls into my bed changes, too. Sometimes it’s 2 or 3am. She goes back to her bed then. Other times, like this morning, it’s 6:30 or 7. She can stay for awhile then.

However, this morning she stayed long enough my arm went to sleep… and my back was telling me it’s time to move. And I told T about it… fully believing S was sound asleep. To my surprise, S said, “Turn over Momma, I’ll rub your back.” Then she snuggled in more… LOL.

“I can’t, Baby, you are on my arm.” She got up so I could turn over, and then she laid her head on my back and started lightly tapping me… for about ten seconds.

This precious little girl is the one the drs. wanted to abort. I think about it every time I see that sweet smile. Every time she puts that little hand in mine, I am reminded how they told me she wasn’t worth keeping. They were wrong. Thank you, Jesus, they were very wrong.

Honesty and the child

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Have I mentioned I am the mother of four? Taking 30 minutes to do my hair is not a luxury I have… who am I kidding??? I don’t think I’ve EVER taken 30 minutes to do my hair!

Saturday I took the morning to have my hair high-lighted (something I once swore I would never do) and cut – hey, my 20th high school reunion is coming up! Anyway, when I got home my sweet babies were napping. When a sleepy G came down the stairs he got a funny look on his face, “Momma, your hair looks silly!”

“Does that mean you don’t like it?”

“It looks silly!” At least he didn’t say it looked bad…

Later that night, after eating dinner, letting them play at the mall and eat dippin dots, as I got into the van G says, “Momma’s hair is yucky.” Nice… honest anyway. I had to laugh at his willingness to just share, Daddy didn’t find it funny and got onto him for talking to his momma that way.

On Sunday I got ready for church, and headed out to round up kids. G looked at me, his face lit up, big blue eyes totally elated, and said…

“Momma, YOU GOT YOUR HAIR BACK!”

You might be a redneck…

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Where is Jeff Foxworthy???? He needs to see this car…

T had somethings to do after church today, so we took two vehicles. He was maybe a block ahead of me when this car passed me, and I thought, “T needs to see this…” so I picked up my phone and called him. Why would I think that? Because like a lot of guys, T is a car guy. Unlike most guys (or maybe there are more of you than I know) he will spend HOURS looking a web sites about car parts, car kits, paint jobs… whatever… it’s enough to make my head spin… and I like cars… just not that much!

Anyway, this car that passed me… T answered and I said “Look at the car that’s to your right…” (Sunday afternoon traffic on OHB can be a nightmare, and the kids and I caught up to T and J.)

“What car?”

“The one to your right… it’s about to pass you… and it has duct tape for racing stripes!”

“No way.”

“Yes.”

“That’s crazy! I see it… that’s crazy!” We hung up… then he called me back “Not duct tape… reflective tape. At least it’s a specialty tape… that’s a step above… not much better, but a step above. And it has decals to look like bullet holes.” Nice… welcome to Tennessee!

Now, these are not the best pix, but all I had was my phone… and I was trying to drive! (We were STOPPED each time I took a pix…)

My Gatorade runneth over

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How much mess can 4 kids make in 24 hours? Really? It’s unbelievable! Then try adding their parents into the mix and WOW!

OK, so for the parents it takes a little more than 24 hours… T was messing with some power tools over the weekend… and didn’t plug the freezer in the garage back in… and yes, a thawing freezer, even one that is not totally full, makes a big mess.

Last night all I wanted to do was sit down and actually eat dinner with my kids. I opened a brand new bottle of Gatorade, poured 3 glasses, and poured the rest of it into a refrigerator bottle and shut the door. I probably sat there ten minutes before G says, “Look at that big yellow mess!” Now, knowing there was nothing yellow in that direction and that my boys often wish to “trick” me, I didn’t even bother looking. Another five minutes, maybe, and J says, “Oh, my! That’s a big orange mess.” OK… Now, I must look… and yes… there on the floor was a big puddle of Gatorade. I’m guessing the door hit the spout on the bottle, and the whole time I sat at the table, Gatorade ran freely in my fridge, and onto the floor!

On to tonight, where K waited patiently, or so I thought, for me to get her food ready… once I got to the table, I found her happily sucking on the spoon she had grabbed from the sour cream sitting on the table, and sour cream from ear to ear… yes, she’s not quite seven months old…

Then there’s G, who got a bath tub shark yesterday. You know, the kind that you pull the string, and the tail flips back and forth so that it “swims.” He wants to play with it in the shower…and grabs a cup. I told him no, he was NOT stopping the drain in the shower… if he wanted the shark to swim, he could get into the tub. End of story… NOT. No, I walked into the bath room to get K’s bath ready and found water running on the floor… from under the shower door! This young man found ANOTHER cup and did it anyway. Off to bed with that one.

Then S gets out of the other shower to show me her boo-boo on her knee (shower still running). As I am trying to dry K and get her pjs on, I tell S to go show Daddy. (It takes several times before she actually goes.) He comes into the bathroom where I am still trying to get K dry and into pjs, saying, “It’s a good thing she got me… she tried to pull a G! The water in the tub was about 4 inches from the top.”

I’m going to bed!

Where is the Hope?

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Let me just be honest… Barack Obama is not the great hope of these United States. Barack Obama is not the messiah (that would be Jesus). Barack Obama is not God, not even a god. And yet the press treats him as such. And I heard on Rush Limbaugh’s program that searching for God on one book seller’s site brought Obama’s book up TWICE. Ugh. Here’s a quote from NewsBusters.org’s Mark Finkelstein

NewsBusters reader Shane S. shared this experience:

I was searching for a book I read in college, “God: A Biography.” I searched Barnes & Noble’s website using the book’s title as my search term. The book I was looking for was the first result given. The second result? “The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream” by the Messiah Himself, Barack Obama.


I tried the experiment myself, and sure enough, it produced the same results. Update: 6:05 PM. Searching for “God: a Biography” no longer leads to the Obama book. You don’t suppose Barnes& Noble reads NewsBusters? But we have the screen capture after the jump, taken this morning, which shows that a search for “God: a Biography” led to The Audacity of Hope.

Not that I think John McCain is all that… honestly there are days I wonder who really would be better. So here’s my question… where are all the honest, upstanding people with a backbone? Who can lead this country in a direction that will NOT drive us into the ground? Who can actually go to D.C. and make changes FOR THE BETTER not just give a good speech and a lot of lip service?

I think people are so afraid of the media hound dogs trying to tear them or their friends and family apart they don’t want anything to do with public life. (Not that I blame them.) And we the public are too content to stand up and demand better behavior out of them… if my kids acted that way they would be corrected, made to apologize and not come out of their room until they could play nice together. Where are their mommas?

Could you hear the water?

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Ah the mind of a child…

The boys had gymnastics for the first time today. As much as they run, jump, tumble and otherwise do moves I could not, even at their age, I figured they would be thrilled with the idea. They were less than…

Once they got there, I guess they got more into it, as the instructor informed me they did well. G’s first question to me, as soon as he got out of the door, was “Why haven’t we been to Hawaii?” What???? I should have seen something coming, as both boys had Hawaiian lei’s on their heads. The more we talked, I learned their theme for the day was “Aloha” and they learned about being trustworthy.

We talked about J’s wanting to go to Hawaii, a topic he had to write about over fall break (that’s another topic), and we talked about my parent’s trip to Hawaii. My dad had r&r in Hawaii while in the army. My mom, I believe seven months pregnant with me, flew over to meet him there. I informed G of this being the only time I’ve ever been to Hawaii. He had to contemplate that for a while. After about five minutes of silence he suddenly said, “Could you hear the water?” What???? “While you were in Hawaii in Grandma’s tummy, could you hear the water?” Wow.

You know, we have been to the ocean before. G knows what it is like to listen to the waves kiss the shore and retreat. Are they the same in Hawaii? As the older brother of two, he knows babies can’t see you, but they can hear you… and sometimes they will kick at you to prove it. It is amazing where his mind goes…

As we drove to eat dinner with Daddy, G fell asleep… and his lei fell too…

Groceries at lunch time and other big messes

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So what does one mom do with groceries to put away, a hungry baby to feed, and a tired toddler who is making big messes? Get the big brothers involved!!??? What was I thinking??? Let me show you what happens when an 8 and 5 year old try to feed a 6 month old…

I’m not sure who made the biggest mess… the toddler who used 1/4 a brand new bottle of pump soap on her hands (and feet, toilet, sink, floor) plus emptied a brand new bottle of detangler (why can a 3 year old get open those plastic wraps on bottles that I have trouble with???) on the floor or the two boys who were very eager for such a chance… and made a big competition out of it!

Anyone want baby kisses now????