A quick stop in at my blog.

OK!

I admit it.

These pictures are a little out dated.

It's been crazy, busy hectic around here lately and I haven't had time to download any new pictures.



Hell, it's taken me over 2 months to update my blog.

I have a lot of pictures of the Girl like this one. As soon as she sees me pointing the camera in her direction, she runs toward me. No amount of pleading or cajoling will convince her to stay in one spot. I do love the close ups, even if they are of only half her face.

We finally got our business up and running and have been running like crazy people ever since. It's going really well and we have all begun to adjust to this new lifestyle. It's been a big adjustment for the kids not having me home with them all the time, but when the Man is done his job we can take turns being at the store and at home with them. We all happened to be home at the same time a few nights ago and the boy says, "Finally, we're all together again. Like a family." I am sensing mild, separation anxiety. Ha ha.

The Boy - Cussin' like a sailor.


I was out for supper with mom and the kids the other night. A lady stopped to chat and when she walked away from the table, I asked the Boy if he knew who that lady was. He said no and when I told him he said, "What the Hell!" Ha ha ha! I had to hide my face behind my cup so he wouldn't see me laughing. When I regained myself, I said, "What did you say?" He repeated, "What the Hell!" Same tone and expression as the first time. I explained to him that that's not a word that kids say, yadda yadda yadda, to which he replied, "Well, mom. I was really surprised." No wonder he has been nicknamed "Professor" by his uncles.

The Girl - Resident Artiste





The girl LOVES to do crafts. The first thing she asks for in the morning is to do some kind of craft, usually painting. Our tiny house is FULL of "boody-ful" and "fab-a-lus" one-of-a-kind originals.


She paints something for everyone she knows and loves to give them their paintings when they come to visit. She will even remember, weeks after painting a picture, who that particular painting was intended for.

Creative and generous, that's my baby!


We had a movie night on Friday night because mommy was BAGGED! The Girl finished her movie and we were going to watch Chicken Little. Well, she wasn't ready to be done with Max and Ruby and proceeded to have a little fit, stomping her feet and proclaiming LOUDLY, "I don't wanna watch Chicken Noodle!" The boy and I started to laugh, which only fueled the tantrum and foot stomping until SHE realized what she had said. She stopped in mid-stomp and started to laugh. A big, deep belly laugh. It was too funny.

And by the way, she loved Chicken Little.

What the . . . .

Where the HELL has time gone?

It's been almost 2 months since I've updated my blog!

It's been so long since I logged in that I couldn't remember my password and had to get a new one! Man, that's sad.

Sadly, I don't have a lot of time to post. I had to check in though, because the Catholic guilt was getting to me. What can I tell you in the few minutes I have?

The kids are doing great. Growing like weeds and suffering with spring fever. The Boy totally digs being outside and would gladly spend every waking moment out there. Especially if he has the dogs out there with him.

Here is the Boy's favorite four-legged playmate. His name is Frank AKA Frankie, Franklin or Fat Frank. (Depending on my mood and how much trouble he's in!) He is a "double coated" Corgi which means he has 10X more hair than the average grizzly. He has soft, fine hair close to his skin (y'know, the kind that floats on every breeze and gets into everything, like your mouth, eyes, food, coffee . . . you get my drift.) No where is safe from Frank's floaty hair. No where. On top of the floaty hairs are long, smooth, shiny hairs that can penetrate every type of fabric known to man, including skin. (If you consider skin a fabric. Which I do.) Frank is a ruthless, indiscriminate, shedding machine. His ability to shed knows no bounds. You can actually watch him shed, from across the room . . . in the dark. Seriously.

This type of hair also means that Frank has to be in water for a long, long time before the water penetrates the hair layer to reach the skin layer. It also means that he needs a long, long, loooooong time to dry once he is *finally* wet to the skin. One must be willing to endure, and commit to, the musty wet dog scent for an indeterminate amount of time. For these reasons, we don't bathe Frank when it is too cold outside for him to spend much of his stinky-time basking in the sun and hopefully drying.

What is the point of mentioning this, you ask? Why the diatribe? Patience, Grasshopper, all will be revealed.

Ok. Now. Where was I? Oh yeah, the yard.

Our yard is only 2 years old and it is far, faaaaaaaaaaaaaar from being a done yard. Our little piece of land, that we are trying to convince and coerce into being a yard, was once a prolific piece of alfalfa producing field. It grew alfalfa and it grew it good. Picture thick, deep, black, fertile soil, and at this time of year, thick, deep, black mud, and lot's of it. Although we put sod down last year, there remains 2 little patches of dirt (mud) right against the back of the house that we had to leave un-sodded last fall so that we could put the weeping tile in this spring.

Well, the Boy found it and somehow managed to get Frank in to it and completely soaked the dog with the mud. He was drenched, to the skin, which, as I have mentioned, is virtually impossible. He must have been at it a long time to get Frank that muddy. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to take a picture so just imagine the light brown dog above, completely black. Yeah, the camera was the last thing on my mind.

The man and I are parent-newbies. Our oldest is only 4 years old. We have much to learn.

One thing we have learned, just recently, is that mud is a kid magnet. If it's there, they'll find it. Secondly, we knew, but apparently forgot, that if they're too quiet for too long, you'd better go find out why. And thirdly, we learned that the aforementioned thick, black mud, is very hard to wash out of Frank's hair. Very. Hard. It is not impossible, but it will require a lot of time, soap and hot water AND a bottle of draino to rid the drain of the massive hairball generated when bathing Frank.

In spite of all the trouble and hard work he is, we're still going to keep him. We made a commitment to love him and raise him, and dammit, that's what we're gonna do. We love that little shit. But we might get rid of Frank. *Wink*

Girl VS Treadmill

Since the beginning of 2008, I have been religiously using the treadmill in my living room.

It takes some planning, on a daily basis, to keep the Boy and the Girl occupied as I do this but we have worked out a good system. I put their morning cartoons on, get them drinks and snacks, turn on the bathroom light (because the Girl won't go in there in the dark which means getting off the treadmill to turn on the light if she needs to go while I'm walking), make sure I turn the TV up loud enough for them to hear it over the mechanical roar of the treadmill and make sure I have the remote in case I underestimated the loudness, have the phone handy, etc., etc., etc.

You get the picture.

So, on Saturday, I have everything set up PLUS the Man is home so he can tend to the needs of the kids for the 45 minutes I am otherwise occupied.

Often, the kids stand at the end of the couch, which is right at the end of the treadmill and chat with me while I huff and puff. Often our conversations are like this, "Mom, why is your face red?", "Mom, how much longer?", "Mom, are you crying?" (No honey, it's sweat, not tears.), "What's sweat?", "Mom, why are you breathing like that?"

You get the picture.

Well, on Saturday, the Girl, in addition to needing me to converse with her, also needed me to have a drink of tea from her tea set. Ok. I can do that.

She hands me the cup. I drink. She takes the cup, loses her balance and falls off the couch, through the front of the treadmill, right under my feet, while I am walking.

Well, panic ensues. The Man comes running, yelling, "Shut it off! Shut it off!" We're both scrambling to pick her up while she bounces along on her face on the rough, moving surface of the treadmill. It happened so fast, but seemed to be slow-motion at the same time.

You get the picture?

No?

Well, here they are.

She got road rash on her nose, cheek, lip and forehead.



The pictures don't show how red it actually was.

But, as is usually the case, the Girl bounced back really quickly. She was ready to pose a few minutes later.

"Show me how tough you are, Baby."

"Arrrr. Me tuff!"


Now, I didn't get away unscathed. I got road rash on my knee pretty good but not good enough to keep me from finishing my 45 minutes!

Here's my knee.

You would think this experience would keep her far, far away from the moving treadmill, right? Wrong. A few minutes later she was at my side asking if she could come on the treadmill with me.

Never a dull moment, eh?

The face of chicken pox.

Until November 2007, I was a chicken pox virgin. I have never had the pox, I have no siblings and these 2 kids are my only kids, so while I had heard of chicken pox, I had never actually gotten within arms length of them. That is until that fateful day in November.

It all began innocently enough. The kids and I were up doing our morning thing, nothing out of the ordinary, until, that is, I noticed a weird, red spot over the boys left eye. "Hmm..that's weird," thought I, "Never seen anything like that before." I called The Man at work to ask him if he'd noticed anything weird on the boy. "Nope, nothin'," he replied, "Except, for the spot over his eye where I scratched him with my watch when we were wrestling last night." "I think it got infected," says I, "it's all weepy and swollen this morning."

We were so naive.
The time came, as it inevitably does, to get out of our jim-jams and into our civvies (get dressed) and that's when it hit the fan. The boys previously unmarred body was now marred . . . with chicken pox, and lot's of' em! Well it seemed like a lot at the time, but as the days wore on we would soon learn the true definition of "covered with chicken pox".

The day progressed as usual, giving us false hope that maybe it wouldn't be so bad, y'know, maybe he'd be one of the ones who didn't really get that sick.
Ya. Right.

Spoke waaaaaaaaaaaaayyy too soon.

Poor guy. Look at him. This was the day he felt the worst.


He had them everywhere, in his mouth, nose and eyes, his hair, legs, arms, back, groin . . . there wasn't any part of him that didn't have chicken pox on it.

He definitely looked the worst here.

Day four brought obvious signs of healing and he was getting a bit of his spark back.

We HAD to get out a bit so we went out into the fresh snow and bright sunshine. I think after awhile, being cooped up is hardest part of being sick. It was great to get out of the house, even for a little while.


There it is! You can see the light coming back into his eyes! The worst is over!
Healing . . .

Healing . . .

The ones above his eyebrow left a scar that I'm sure will fade over time but are still pretty noticeable. Makes him look rough and tough and hard to bluff and handsome to boot! (Just like his daddy!)


And finally, a bright light in the gloomy darkness of chicken pox-ness, a beacon of hope, if you will . . . a birthday!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!
The boy turned 4 today!

We had a small party with a few friends.
We played "Count the scars" and "Name that scab", ate soft, bland food and gave out goody bags containing calamine lotion, oatmeal and children's Tylenol. A great time was had by all!

Ha ha! Just kidding!

We did have company that day though. One of the boys friends, the daughter of my "farm-case" friend (see my previous post if you don't know who she is), spent the day with us because she was also in the process of getting over chicken pox and couldn't go to school or to the sitter's, so she came and hung out with us. It was great to have her here, she was a much needed distraction for 2 house-bound siblings and their referee mother.

That evening, we had a small party with the 4 of us and Grandma. Any excuse to have cake!


The boy got a Playmobile set which he was uber-excited about. He's a nut for animals so this was totally up his alley.



He healed up really nicely over the next few days. You can see that the one in his eyelashes is healing up and his eye lid is no longer swollen.


By this point he is all healed up. The only remaining evidence of the pox are the scars over his eye. It did take over a week to get all the scabs out of his hair. I didn't realize how many were in there until they were all dried up. (Which says something about how often I brush his hair, but that's another discussion for another day. Ha ha!)


So, there it is.

Our harrowing tale of Chicken Pox infection and survival. Definitely a Hallmark movie in the making. (:

Wile E. Coyote. Super Genius.

I celebrated a milestone birthday this month and on the actual day of my birth I was in a BIG city celebrating the milestone birthday of my Metis Sister. I had a blast and when I get some pictures, I'll tell you all about it. Trust me, you don't want to miss the juicy details.

Anyhoo, I have been home, recovering from the fun and frivolity, for a week now and am just getting over the sleep deprivation and sore stomach muscles from laughing my ASS off with a bunch of crazy, booze soaked chicks.

I should have known something was up when the man offered me a sleep-in-day today. Offered it.
We don't do that. We typically use the sleep-in-day as currency to get other things we want from each other. We barter it, not offer it. That should have been clue #1.

Then when I got up this morning, he had been cleaning. Ya. Cleaning. Should have been clue #2.

I asked him why the phone was left in the bathroom, like he had been having a conversation that he didn't want to risk me overhearing and had inadvertently left the evidence of his sneakiness on the bathroom counter. He said he had been talking to my mom and that she was coming over on the afternoon. For those of you who are still counting, those are clue #'s 3 and 4.

I was a little freaked that my mom was coming over. It is a Saturday, after all. We RARELY EVER see her silver-headed self on weekends, especially the most hoarded of weekend days, Saturday! I started having paranoid thoughts, "Why is she coming here? It's Saturday, for god sakes! She never comes over on Saturday, even when we ask. Oh my god . . . somethings up. She's coming to deliver some kind of news. It must be bad if she has to come and deliver it in person on a Saturday."

As the morning continued, the Man kept suggesting that I have a shower. Every time I mentioned something I was going to do, like run the dishwasher, start some laundry, eat breakfast, he would say, "That sounds great. Why don't you have a shower first?" I finally relented and had a shower. I was in no condition to argue, what with my paranoid, angst-ridden brain swirling with worry about what bombshell my mom was coming over to lay on us. Besides that, I was all sweaty from walking back and forth to the calendar to confirm that it was, in fact, Saturday. Shower nagging = clue #5.

When I emerged from the shower, all dewey and angelic-looking (read: wet, wrinkly and water-logged) the girl was waiting for me with her finger pressed to her lips saying "Shhhhhh momma. It's your birfday." "My birfday?" I said, "What do you mean it's my birfday?" The Man, having overheard this exchange emerged from the shadows with a belated birthday card for me, decorated with stickers and pen scribbles, proclaiming his embarrassment over having not given me a card for my birthday. Ok. Clue #6. In my defense though, the girl, who is 2, still thinks it's Christmas. There is still snow, after all. So her whispered announcement of my birthday is truly not to be unexpected. A 2 year olds grasp of times and dates are relative. You gotta love them for that.

Then, a friend, who lives out in the boonies and "spends the whole damn week in town and sure as hell isn't going to come back in on my days off" shows up at my door, unannounced and unexpected (by me, anyway) with her 2 little girls in tow. "Hey!", I exclaim, "What the hell are you doing here?" To which she replies, "I had to make myself scarce at home. My dad is butchering pigs." Clue #7!!!

The alarm bells should have been ringing by this time because if you knew this friend of mine, you'd know that she is a mild-mannered, book-keeping, number-crunching accountant-type by day but when 5 o'clock rolls around she is a calf-pulling, chicken-butchering, butter tart baking bitch. She is a farmer trapped in an accountant's briefcase, she's a farm-case, a close relation of the nut-case. AND, as if I needed to provide MORE evidence of my dunce-ness, she could have been at home doing the GST for the farm, y'know, crunching numbers and shit, and instead she was IN TOWN. *shaking head* How could I have been so blind? Not to mention, and I really shouldn't mention this, her eldest innocently asked me, "Who else is coming?" Coming? Here? When? (What'cho talkin' bout, Willis?) *sigh* I'm thick sometimes. (I dare say, I am genical sometimes, but that's another topic for another day.)

Lastly, the Boy, who is on his bunk bed looking out his bedroom window, exclaims. "Mom! Someone else is here! Quick! Look! It's formerly-fat-Cousin-who-is-now-skinny and her husband and their kids!" (You remember my policy on names on my blog, right? I was going to call her kinda-fat Cousin but that seemed too passive aggressive, same with still-pretty-fat Cousin, so formerly-fat-Cousin-who-is-now-skinny will have to do for now, soon she shall be known as formerly-fat-Cousin-who-is-now-skinny-but not-as-skinny-as-me! Plus, I have height on my side. I'm taller than her by like 10 inches. She's quite . . . um . . . how do I say this nicely? . . . squat. Yeah, that's it. She's squatly. And, as if I need more on my side, I wear jealousy-green much better than she does.)

Anyway, I digress.

Remember a few posts ago I said that I'd cut it the hell out with the epic posts? Well, forget I said that.

Ok. Now I digress.

So, I answer the door and there they are, "What the hell are you doing here?", I ask. "Just visiting," replies the husband of my Cousin. "Happy Birthday!", Cousin exclaims thrusting a card (empty, without money in it, I will later find out) into my hand. "Thank you," I say, still completely oblivious, masterfully exhibiting my genetic connection to the "obliviatum dunder-head-ikus monkey", now long extinct.

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"Wait a minute . . . are you guys here for my birthday? Am I having a party?"

The lights go on, the proverbial lights not the real lights, (Wouldn't this have been sooooooooooooo much funnier had all of this transpired in the dark! The real dark, not the proverbial dark.) and I slowly come to the realization that my dear, sweet, shower-nagging husband has planned a surprise birthday party for me!!!! He even made extra sure not to let me be surprised in my grubby old pajamas with my hair sticking out in 16 different directions and remnants of yesterdays mascara still shadowing my blood-shot, bleary eyes! He tricked me into basking in the attention of my friends and family with a clean face, styled hair a shirt that was neither holey nor slept in. He SURPRISED me! He planned and orchestrated and had my mom bring 2 pans of the best damn Skor cheesecake this side of the alfalfa field! He loves me and I love him!

But if he ever fuckin' tricks me again, I'll kick his ass!