All My Children...

This is the card I've chosen for our family Christmas card this year.. I couldn't get everyone to look "perfect" but I think this is pretty damn close.. Especially my younger son on the left, this pretty much captures his essence! doh!

How about a bowl of bitch slap??

This was my response to my youngest son who kept whining about how he was hungry.. but would not tell me what he wanted.. I know how bad this sounds, but I did say it with a smile, and he had no idea what bitch slap was, nor would he ever repeat it.. I basically said it under my breath.. but I tell you, the frustration this child inflicts upon me, makes me wish someone would bitch slap ME! I swear, a good swift slap across the face might feel better than his incessant whining! I'm just sayin'..

My mother is having a colonoscopy today, just for a screening. Last night I had a dream that during the procedure, they found that she had an inoperable brain tumor. I told my sister about the dream, and how bizarre to find a brain tumor when they were going up her butt.. she reminded me that's usually where her head is anyway! haha..

Anyway, Thanksgiving was nice.. I drank a lot of wine, and laughed too much at the antics of my 6 year old, which only made him do them over and over.. The babies are not very social, and did a fair amount of crying.. they definitely like being at home.

Saturday night my husband and I (along with the crabbier of the twins) went over to CTales house for dinner. She's about to give birth, and looks just wonderful.. another one of those women who only gets pregnant in their belly! Her boyfriend cooked, it was great, I had heard lots about what a great cook he was, and there was no exaggerating there! He's also got a lot of toys.. and not grown up toys like some of you perv's might be thinking, but kids toys! My husband spent a majority of the evening trying to solve the Rubik's cube.. Anyway, my sister in law stayed home with the boys and the other twin, who cried for a couple of hours then passed out. I can't wait for the day when going out with my husband doesn't require taking one of the babies with us.. although I'm expecting that won't be for a few years!

TURKEY DAY.. AND MY NICE BUTT

I was able to fit into my "nice butt" jeans today! Yee ha, victory at last.. I might just wear them forever! It's so nice to finally be out of all my maternity clothes and have my old wardrobe back (which needs some serious updating by the way!) I have no style though, as my friends would attest to. I'm just plain, and rather boring in every style department (hair, clothes etc) One of my good friends wants me to cut my hair, and get an actual style. However, long and straight IS a style of it's own, right?
Anyway, enough about that.. Tomorrow is Turkey day..my boys are looking forward to seeing their cousins and eating lots of crap. This will be the first Thanksgiving in years that I haven't gone to my in-laws. This Thanksgiving we're going to my older sisters place, and having it with my side of the family. I'm happy to do this for one reason- my twin sister. She's the one who really gave me grief about boycotting this particular holiday and always spending it with my husbands family. It's more important to her now because of her daughter. I'm looking forward to it though, family outings are a great way to get a break from your children, especially babies.. other people just love to hold the babies!
My brother in law, who is the culinary expert in the family, is making a bunch of food for the dinner. He's making some veggie sushi, and some kielbasa thing.. I can't wait.. My older sister won't eat any of it, and if she does, I'll be shocked. She's a buffalo wing, mozzarella stick kind of girl... nothing wrong with that, but she won't try anything new.
My husband and I are going to celebrate the conception of the twins too, as it was last Thanksgiving that we unknowingly expanded our family.. Thank the good lord that we won't, and can't do that again!! Happy Thanksgiving!!

I love my little sociopath..but he's making me CRAZY!!!!

I know that children learn best through repetition, god knows I get it! But my youngest son has taken this to new heights.. His thing is this, anything he sees, he has to tell me which one is his favorite. Anything. It could be something on a cereal box, on a toy, on t.v. Absolutely anything. I could handle that, but there's always a catch.. He needs me to repeat it. "Which one do me like mama?" Just to make sure that I'm paying attention. And if I don't repeat it right away, I hear this (in a very loud voice) "SAAAY IT" It is literally gnawing away at my soul, and unfortunately it doesn't end there.. He then wants to know which one is my favorite.. Let's take one of his favorite shows "Franklin" He's told me that his favorite is the beaver "Me like the beaver mama, who's your favorite?" If I even think about saying that I like the beaver too, he'll go nuts and insist that HE likes it, and I can't.. or if I pick something that his brother or father have already claimed as their favorite, then it's meltdown hell again.. I try. I really do, to be patient, and I'm not kidding when I say that for the past few weeks, this has been one long conversation about favorites. He does this from morning til night..I've been praying for more patience with him, I can see his little face contort when I give him the look that says "I know who your favorite is..you've already told me 50 times today!!" I know he's just trying to get some attention from me, and this is how he chooses to do it lately. But pretty soon I'm going to lose my shit.. Why can't he just kill bugs or small animals? Like other sociopaths?

Mrs. Sippy

My 6 yr. old is really into spelling these days. Which I think is great. But if I hear again how to spell my own name, I might have to hurt him.. Tonight at dinner I thought I would give him a bit of a challenge.. "spell Mississippi.." And that's what he came up with! Pretty damn cute!

She's still too little for the high chair and hit her head on the tray once..but it was fun to try, and she actually sat in it while I held her sister and got dinner for the boys.. oh, and she totally didn't even notice when she banged her head!

Len Cabral..

I saw this man read at my son's school the other day. He was amazing, and quite easy on the eyes (did I just say that??) Anyway, if you have children and want to get them a great c.d. of story telling, then get something from him. He has a fabulous kind of funny Rhode Island voice (the hahvahd yahd thing) But it sounded really good coming out of his mouth.. Anyway, I highly recommend it! www.lencabral.com

I brought my oldest son back to his doctor today. He had a run of anti-biotics a couple weeks ago, for what they thought was a sinus infection. It never cleared up, and last night after he experienced some shortness of breath and a nasty coughing attack, I called this morning and brought him back in. His doctor thinks he might have asthma. He's going on an inhaler that we'll need to use 3x a day, and hopefully in either a few days or a week, his cough will be gone. I can't imagine what else this could be, nor do I want to..
In other news (cause there's always other news in my life..) My brother moved back to town 3 days ago.. and then moved away again today.. That was music to my ears (the part where he left town) I haven't seen him in about 4 years (he only moved from Southern Maine, so less than an hour away) but we're less than close. I always make it a point to tell anyone who knows that we're related that he's my 1/2 brother.. Anyway, my mother met with him yesterday, it was the first time she had seen him in about a year. He's always been off doing his own ridiculous thing (which usually includes impregnating women-he has 9 kids!) My mom could hardly recognize him. He's gone from a lean 175lbs to almost 250, and has no top teeth! Must be a looker! I guess he was in the middle of having his teeth extracted for dentures and somehow lost his benefits. I can never believe a word that comes out of his mouth though, so for all I know he could have lost them all in a bar fight, we'll never know. But nonetheless, he looks the part of derelict drugged up alcoholic that he is.. He was out looking for work, making calls.. yada yada.. He told my mom that if he got an interview he was going to borrow his father's dentures.. ewh.. Anyway, I got word that he left town today (thank god..) and is back in Maine. Who know's where he is, or when he'll be back.. I'm content not seeing him ever again.. It's hard to pretend that I don't have a brother if I run into him in town!

The Fairy's A Coming..

Ok, I didn't do it, couldn't do it, and will not do it.. if you're confused, check below.. My son came home, took a huge turd, I tried with the plunger to move it around in the bowl, even took a wooden skewer and tried poking at it, but that's as far as I went.. yea, it was nasty, and I came away thinking it's a good story about how he swallowed the first tooth he lost, and there will plenty more for me to save.. He's slightly devastated that his tooth is lost, he's afraid the tooth fairy won't come.. I explained that the tooth fairy was like Santa and she was magic and could find his tooth no matter where it is (even if it's in his poop!) I think he'll be ok.. My younger son, on the other hand, is in a panic at the thought of some little fairy coming into his room while he's sleeping.. It's just like the Easter bunny, when both of them were freaked out about some huge rabbit walking around our house.. "what if he comes upstairs???" Someday they're going to be really pissed at my husband and I for all the tales we've told about these made up gift givers.. And all the times I said "you better be good, Santa's watching.."

My son finally lost his first tooth this morning.. it's been a month in the making, in fact his new tooth has already grown up behind it.. I've been begging him to let me pull it.. but he's a cautious boy and wouldn't let me have my fun. Last night before bed he let me get in there pretty good, it was hanging on by it's last root, and was just screaming for me to pull it. However, I was unsuccessful at this and had to send the boy to bed with the tooth fairy put off for yet another night.
I had been telling him that he didn't want to swallow it.. that would not make for a nice clean tooth to leave for the tooth fairy.. Well, where do you think it is right now?? Somewhere in his lower intestine I'm guessing, because I cannot find it anywhere in my house. He swore it was still in his mouth when he woke up, but soon after breakfast he noticed it was gone.. must have slid down with his sausage! So now I'm torn.. he wants the tooth to leave for the tooth fairy.. and I hate to say, but I'm leaning toward excavating his shit, and trying to find it. I'm a bit of a pack rat when it comes to my kids things.. this is gross (although not as gross as gloving it up and rummaging through his bowel movements) but I have all of my kids belly button stumps. I don't know why I kept them, and I certainly have no idea what I'll ever do with them, but that's just me.. can't help it..
I'm going to see how it goes.. maybe it'll turn up somewhere outside his body.. if not, I might just be doing something that will surely make me gag, and probably puke, but how can I not save his tooth?? His first tooth?? Ugh..

Grocery Shopping..

I hate grocery shopping, but my son loves it.. here he is in my kitchen playing a game we made up today.. see his little grocery carriage?? He shopped and I was the cashier!

Poop (again..)

I haven't had any good poop stories in a while, and having 4 kids, there's always one floating around (ha ha)..
My oldest son (age 6) has had the hardest time learning to wipe his own ass. I don't know if his dexterity won't allow it, or if he's just afraid to, but finally after months and months, I think he's got it down.. But it was not an easy road for any of us! Let's just say he wasn't sure what to do with the poop if it happened to get on his hands. yea, pretty gross, right? Sure as shit it was! I found little pieces of smeared poop on the wall next to the toilet (mixed in with some toilet paper, nice huh?) We also found some rubbed onto the toilet bowl itself.. very nice! After finding all this shit everywhere, we told him he needed to wash his hands if it got on him, or to call us for help. (btw, he was washing his hands, just not before he had wiped it off where ever he found it convienient) The problem was solved, he washed his hands and no more shit on my walls.. however, a few weeks later, much to the horror of my husband, he found all sorts of poop on our soap dispenser.. the poor boy, he was trying.. by then we were getting concerned with why he seemed to be getting so much poop on his hands.. I can see it happening every so often, but this seemed to be all the time.. Well, I guess along the way while we were teaching to wipe his butt, we weren't clear on how much toilet paper to use. Apparently he thought one little square would suffice.. he might as well have been wiping his ass with his hand anyway! jeez..
Here's a lesson for anyone that is going to be changing a newborn any time soon.. When putting a new diaper on, NEVER aim their little butt toward your head.. newborns have incredibly explosive shits, and you never know when it's coming.. but you can depend on it being frequently! And you can pretty much count on it getting in your face if you're holding it's legs up to get the new diaper on. It's some kind of scientific law.. it will hit you! Most likely in one of your eyes too.. (or was that just me??)
I never thought I would have so many thoughts on poop- of course this was before I had my litter of children. Nowadays, my husband and I have poop conferences "yea, she pooped twice, but the other one hasn't yet.. man, I hope she does, it could be a long night" Or "Was it mustardy, or runny?" or, "don't put her in that, it has shit stains all over the back" or "I hope you washed your hands young man.. Is that chocolate???" Gotta love the poop!!

I went and got my haircut today.. much to my husband's subtle objections "how much is it??" ugh.. I haven't had a haircut since February! It was time, and pulease, I'm soooo low maintenance! Anyway, the woman who usually cuts my hair has retired..total bummer considering she was my "first" But I went to the lovely girl who is seeing all of her clients. She's got a 6 week old girl (and looks like she's never been pregnant before- yes, I hate her) She did a good job, I was just happy to see some of the dead stuff fall to the floor! I will miss my old stylist Carla though.. boo hoo..
Recently, feeling nostalgic, I got out my wedding pictures. I don't think my kids have ever seen the photo album, at least I knew they hadn't seen the very back of it.. the pics of my bachellorette party and the STRIPPER!! My son had early release today, and the first thing he did after getting off the bus, was pick up the book. I was on an important phone call (really, I was) and he taps me on the back-totally ignoring that I'm on the phone and goes "Mom, why were the police there??" And "why is he naked??" Good lord.. does anything belong to just ME anymore? I guess not.. thankfully his little brother diverted his attention and I snagged the book and put it away.. I wasn't prepared to explain strippers to him just yet! Or why his mother had some guys privates gyrating in her face! Jeez.. who thought taking pictures at one of those parties was a good idea, and why the hell did I put it in an album? Oh, and he wasn't totally naked, he had a very tasteful blue and white striped thong on, K? ;)

I just can't stop posting their pictures.. I'm turning into one of those annoying parents who brag about their kids all the time.. sorry.. but they are just so friggin cute!!

SMILE!!

Here are my kids.. we went and had their pictures done over this past weekend.. it was easier than I thought.. except that the youngest twin (in red) puked all over herself before we even started.. but the automatic dryer in the bathroom worked wonders and everyone was still smiling when we left!