(R)evolutionary Idea

If you know me, you might have heard me wish out loud at some point for a third arm. I have said it before--and I'll say it again--that I think while a woman's belly is growing and her whole body is changing anyway, why not grow an extra arm (complete with fingers, of course) during pregnancy? Believe me, I would use it!

I can't tell you how many times I have needed that extra arm. For example, this morning I was changing a poopy diaper. Logan is at that fun age where he is learning about his body, so while I was trying to wipe poop off his bum, he was trying to thwart me and distribute the poop onto nearby books, toys and his face. Yuck!!! If I had had that third arm, it wouldn't have been a problem. One hand to wipe, one to hold on to his legs and that third arm to keep his hands out of the mess.

After embarking on this adventure called Mommyhood, I feel like I have gotten pretty stinkin' awesome at doing things with the hands I have. I can unscrew the lid, fill, nuke and re-screw the lid of a bottle/sippy cup while holding a screaming baby. I can carry a baby, diaper bag, purse and up to 4 bags of groceries up three flights of stairs to the third floor where we live. I can unfold a stroller with a baby in my arms. When Logan was tiny, I could even use a public bathroom without setting him on the floor. I will tell you that buttoning your jeans while holding an infant is no small task, but I have done it! The problem comes when there's just no physical way of working around the lack of hands.

Like after I have climbed the three flights of stairs with the groceries and all that stuff, if my key gets stuck in the door (and it usually does), I need two hands to yank on the doorknob while jiggling the key and occasionally pounding on the door and getting mad and praying I brought the cell phone in case the door won't open and I have to call maintenance. That would be one instance when a third arm would be nice.

So next time I get invited to be on the Human Evolution Committee and we're voting on what we're doing next, I'm all over this third arm idea. I know that ditching our baby toes has been winning straw polls and caucuses and stuff, but I really think this is the direction we want to go. So tell your Congressperson to vote "Yes" on the "Giving Moms a Hand Up" initiative.

Yarrrrr!

Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day! I have celebrated this auspicious holiday for years, mostly by remembering that it's International Talk Like a Pirate Day as I'm on my way to bed. At that point I do my best "Yarrrrr!" at Casey with a mouthful of toothpaste and promise myself that next year I'll remember before bedtime.

So, this time I actually remembered! In honor of my rememberingness, I went to a sage old pirate and he bestowed upon me a real, honest to goodness pirate name so that I can be all fearsome and stuff. This is my pirate name with accompanying description:

My pirate name is:

Dirty Morgan Cash

You're the pirate everyone else wants to throw in the ocean -- not to get rid of you, you understand; just to get rid of the smell. You're musical, and you've got a certain style if not flair. You'll do just fine. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

Then, of course, I had to get my family involved. Casey learned his pirate name too. We must really be married. Same last name and everything!

My pirate name is:

Dirty Harry Cash

You're the pirate everyone else wants to throw in the ocean -- not to
get rid of you, you understand; just to get rid of the smell. You're
musical, and you've got a certain style if not flair. You'll do just fine.
Arr!

Get your own pirate name
from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

Yarrrrr!

Too Cool For School

Katherine missed the deadline for kindergarten...barely. So of all her friends she is the only one not going to kindergarten this year. Two Tuesdays ago was the first day of school and Katherine was not happy to be excluded from it. She cried when we drove past the elementary school and she saw the swarm of kids with their backpacks and all the school buses and begged me to take her. "I will be good!" she cried, as if her behavior was somehow the reason she couldn't go to school. When I explained, again, that she was too young, she said, "But I will be five on my birthday! I am a big girl!"

Back in February, Casey and I decided to have Katherine tested for early enrollment to kindergarten. We felt that she was outgoing enough and smart enough to fit in with the older kindergartners. When we got the test results back, we were pretty disappointed. Katherine had scored quite high on math and reading and had done well in General Knowledge (whatever that is), but she lacked the dexterity (in other words her handwriting was awful...which sadly is an inherited trait. Neither Casey nor I is going to win a handwriting competition any time soon) and the maturity to really be a good candidate. She was still four after all.

In retrospect, there are things I would have done differently. I also have my opinions about the testing process, but it is what it is and I can't change the school district's decision. I try not to think about it too much because Mama Bear comes out and I know I'm being biased. Every mother thinks her child is the brightest and beautifulest and the most special child ever. But mine really is! (kidding!.....kind of) Anyway....

During the summer, I looked into preschool for her, but all the private ones were WAY too expensive, like the price of college tuition expensive. Some of the elementary schools around here have free Pre-K for those who are low income or have a child with special needs. The rest of us get put on a waiting list where we languish and die. Until I learned about the school district's Pre-K program, I was never unhappy about Casey's job. For one brief moment I actually wished he was a grad student again! Then a beautiful ray of sunlight pierced the preschool gloom. That ray was called Joy School.

I have a friend who is participating in Joy School with a few other ladies around town. She told me about it and said they were still looking for one more mom to spread out the load. I jumped at the chance. It's not free and it is certainly not easy, given that I will have to teach one week a month, but it sure beats the pants off $238 a week (!) plus miscellaneous fees and......ugh....fundraisers for preschool. It also gives Katherine a classroom atmosphere that isn't Sunday School. And it gives me two whole hours twice a week to do whatever I want, which--let's face it--is usually running errands or cleaning, but eventually I hope to be able to just be a slug during that time.

Katherine has been in Joy School for two weeks and is having the time of her life. She has her own backpack and a school box with crayons and scissors. She also gets to paint, sing and play with other kids. She is on Cloud 9 and it couldn't have happened to a nicer girl.

Bupp!

My son enjoys a good joke. Considering that he was mercilessly teased from the moment he joined the family, this is hardly surprising. What is surprising is that he responded in kind at such an early age. Logan told me his first joke when he was ten months old. He was sitting on my lap, being all cute and snuggly, when he reached for my finger. The joke goes something like this:

"Hey Mom! Gimme your finger for a minute! Watch me jam it into my mouth, chew on it and drool on it. Hahahahahaha!!!! Get it? I chewed your finger, Mom! It's funny!"

Since then, he has become a connoisseur of fine humor ranging from throwing food, pacifiers and toys on the floor (and laughing hysterically when Mommy picks said thing up for the 9000th time) to experimentally poking the cat to get the best noises. But his favorite joke is also his first word. His first word is "Bupp!" The exclamation point is important because he never just says "Bupp," or "Bupp...." It's "Bupp!" or he doesn't say it at all. Anyway...

"Bupp!" is the word Logan says when he honks somebody's nose or lips or ears, or whatever protruding body part he can reach. And he does this A LOT. It makes it worse that this kid turns into a 12-legged octopus (would that make him a dodecapus?) when it's time to clip those scratchy little fingernails. I can get about two nails clipped before I give up. That means that there are often long, pointy baby nails on and inside my nose when he decides to be silly.

So if you see me with long scratches on my face, it wasn't the cat or some kind of shaving accident. It was just Logan telling jokes.

Only at Our House

Scene: Yesterday afternoon, Mommy and Katherine sitting in the living room, putting a puzzle together. Enter Daddy with a bowl of ice cream.
Katherine: (spying the bowl). Ooooh!!! Olives!!

Katherine: (upon reaching the bowl) Oh, never mind. It's just ice cream.

Monkey See Monkey Do

Mommies Don't Get Sick Days

I am feeling yucky today. I have a cold, which I think makes either number 3 or 4 since moving and I am really really tired of feeling crummy. If I was child-less and still working, I'd muscle through it and go to work, armed with Kleenexes and cough drops, then collapse on the couch when I got home and have my husband spoon-feed me chicken soup. Or, if I was really sick, I'd just take a sick day and sleep all day. But I have kids and it doesn't work like that.

Rule Number 3 of the "Mommy Handbook" says that mommies don't get sick days (Rules 1 and 2 are, "You will be barfed, sneezed, bled, drooled and coughed on. Get used to it," and "Mommies are not guaranteed uninterrupted sleep," respectively). And while I read the "Mommy Handbook" before embarking on motherhood, that doesn't mean I don't get to complain about the rules. Yes, being sick is one of the worst things about motherhood, except potty-training. Potty training is definitely the worst thing I've had to do so far, but being sick is up there too.

If my children were empathetic, being sick wouldn't be so bad, but they're not. Logan doesn't care that I feel gross. He still wants to eat weird stuff off the floor and whack his head on things. In fact it seems that he's the opposite of empathetic because he gets himself into more trouble when I'm sick. Katherine, on the other hand, understands that I'm not feeling my finest and we're not going to Disneyland or the zoo or Paris (thank you Fancy Nancy for that one) today. She also knows not to bother me unless it's important, but you would be surprised to learn what sorts of things she considers "important." There have been multiple emergency sash retyings on her dress-up dress, as well as narrowly averted Barbie wardrobe disasters.

My one shining star in this is my sweet husband who tries his very best to alleviate my suffering. He makes dinner, herds the children and puts them to bed. But unfortunately he's only around for about 2 1/2 of our kids' waking hours.

But perhaps the worst part of all is knowing that despite my nearly constant hand-washing, elbow-sneezing and Lysol-spraying, everyone else is going to get this thing. And then, I will be taking care of sick people, which runs me back into Rules 1 and 2 in the "Mommy Handbook."

In the Cirrrrrrrrrcllllllllllllllle, the ciiiirrrlllllle of liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiife!