Busy

August 14, 2009

This weekend I did this:

And this:

Yes. I moved.

It all happened rather quickly and honestly right up until the very last minute I kept thinking that it was going to fall through. Even in the two week interim between actually buying the house and moving in to this house I was certain something would go wrong. So I didn’t want to mention it at all lest I jinxed the whole damn thing. So far that seems to have worked. We have been living in our new house since Monday and they* haven’t come by and said, “We have made a terrible mistake. You can not buy this house. Get out!”

I am never moving again.

At least that is what I said until I found a scorpion in my dryer. It was dead. And conveniently washed and dried. But STILL. A SCORPION. Those are much more scary than mice. And aren’t scorpions deadly? After I saw the scorpion I was all WHERE ARE THEY?**

I haven’t seen another one.

I have also completely avoided my laundry room for two days.

I have a confession to make here internet. I hate cats. Yes, I do. Don’t tell me your cat is different, that I would like your cat if I got to know it. Because you know what? I hate your cat, too. The reason I am telling you this is that I believe the previous owners of this house had cats. And kept a litter box in the master bathroom/closet area or in the laundry room or both. Because both of these areas stink like cat piss. Either that or nests of scorpions smell strikingly similar to cat piss and the scorpions are just lying in wait for the opportunity to come out of the walls and kill me in my sleep.

It is entirely possible.

*****
All of my Christmas stuff is currently located in boxes stacked in my kitchen. The door to the attic above the garage is currently blocked by other boxes of random shit that I should probably just throw away. I will admit that I am more than a little bit tempted to just leave it there since Christmas will be here before I know it.

*****

For the first time EVER in my parenting tenure I am in the middle of the back to school frenzy. School supply lists, back to school clothes, schedules, school buses and a whole bunch of things that keep jumping out and surprising me like BACKPACKS and LUNCH BOXES. What do they bring their lunch to school in? And do I really have to pack 6 lunches a day in a box? And what do I put in their backpacks? And why has my daughter decided that her favorite color is blue now when every last thing she owns is pink and is therefore COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE.

*****
I just got my second over $700 electric bill. Yes, I know that this is much much less than I would pay for heat in CT during the coldest winter months, but this still kills me. Maybe because cooling your house is pretty much optional. I could choose to sweat. I won’t. But I could. If I weren’t spolied and completely adverse to stewing in my juices.

*****
Speaking of stewing in my own juices, I have been doing more of this:

Or more accurately the watching of it. Last night I was sitting there and felt sweat rolling down my back in a little stream. It was even more gross that it sounds, if that is possible.

*****
So to recap. I have been busy moving, living among boxes, avoiding laundry and therefore certain death, acquiring crap to send my kids to school, and using incredible amounts of electricity. I might need to become a hooker to pay for the last two.

* I don’t know who they are. Just they. The they that inflicts all sorts of wrongs on people.

** They never come when you want them to.

My Every Night

August 12, 2009

Dinner time? More Like Feeding Time at the Zoo

August 5, 2009

My baby plays hard.

He is my baby. He will always be my baby. My last born. And even though he is all legs and elbows I still scoop him up and carry him around. He still allows me to cuddle him like he is tiny baby, his head resting in the crook of my arm. Admittedly, I need to rest my arm on something because egads that kid has a big ol’ heavy head.

The photo belies the chaos and noise that was swirling around him while I took these photos. I live in a noisy house.

A house where dinner conversation revolves around shouting, standing up on your chair to make sure your point got across to everyone in the entire neighborhood, where armpit farts and joke telling are de rigueur.

A house where children need to be reminded that jack knives are not for cutting their meat. We have proper knives for that. Where shirt hems are used as napkins and mostly I ignore it.

A house where rocks line the edges of placemats and long sticks that might be swords, or guns, or other weapons of mass destruction lean up against dirty thighs on kitchen chairs. Where getting up and doing a reenactment of an event that ends with a backflip would not be out of the ordinary.

Nor would hearing me say, “I’m not going to the ER today, boys. If you get hurt you are totally walking there yourself. Or crawling. Whatever.”

A house where sweaty boys with dirty little fingernails live.

I was talking on the phone the other night to THE! Heather! B! and we were laughing about something or other, inspite of us both just getting over being really sick. Heather said I should write a book, a parenting book. And we both burst out laughing. heather has been to my house several times. She has met the kids. She has seen our family in action. After a few minutes I paused, “Wait, you are laughing with me right?”

*****

Dinner conversation last night:

Me: So if you could only have five foods for the rest of your life, what would they be?

Ice cream!
Ice cream!
Candy!
Pancakes!

But, wait a minute, if we had the ingredients tomake those foods couldn’t we make them into different foods instead?

No.

But why?

Because it is my rules and I say no. Only five already prepared foods.

But how would we get them?

Sheesh, I don’t know. They would fall from the sky like manna, okay?

But…

Just go with it, ok?

Soda!
Candy!
CANDY!
Gum!
LOTS OF GUM!!!

Okay, but technically those aren’t foods.

Spaghetti and meatballs.
NY Strip Steak, medium.

Now we are talking.

10 yr old: Brussel Sprouts.

At which point we all turn to look at him, the room falls silent.

Who are you? I ask.

We all laugh.

Do you even like brussel sprouts? someone asks over the laughter.

No. Not really.

The laughter bursts out of all of us. Those of us who were eating are trying to hold the food in our mouths. There may have even been fists banging on the table and hands slapping knees, it is hard to say.

What? You didn’t say I had to like the foods!

Silly me for thinking that was OBVIOUS. Thank God he is cute.

Bad Ass Texas Boys

August 3, 2009

Don’t mess with them, they look like they might cut you.

After their second* football practice. In 104 degree weather.

I’d say they are fitting in here just fine.

And thus this blog is ushered from baseball season to football season. I know, my life is exciting. Don’t be hatin’

*I missed the first practice because I was too busy on Saturday DYING in bed, only getting up periodically to vomit up my spleen.