Odds Are...

When you are the only boy in the bunch(excluding Ben-he's a man!) and you're the youngest child to boot, odds are you are going to come across a lot of girlie toys. This happened to Weston recently. Avery left her "My Little Ponies" on the the living floor, and Weston having no prejudices towards girlie things(he's not aware of cooties yet), promptly picked it up and tried stuffing it into his mouth. I of course thought it was hilarious and wanted to document the first of many times Weston would be playing with girlie toys(whether coerced or by his own free will). Ben came in, took one look at me photographing our son with a sparkly pony, made some sort of comment about me "demasculinating our son" and went to get the bin of cars. The pony was traded for a car and Weston resumed stuffing and drooling.


A side note: Ben and I felt it was important to offer a wider variety of toys to our girls to round out their personalities, you know, mix in a few cars, tools, and dinosaurs with the polly pockets and baby dolls. However, when the dinosaurs and cars were inviting each other to tea parties and balls, we gave up.

Tooth Fairy Blues

I love being a mom, and I love traditions and holidays, I just wish some traditions were more compatible with the demands of motherhood, i.e. the tooth fairy. It's 7 o' clock at night, ben was out of town, Avery and Weston were sick and Eden comes running in to my room excited because she finally lost her tooth. She starts going on and on about the tooth fairy coming and what she'll leave for her. My mind begins to race trying to remember if I had any cash in my wallet, any in Ben's drawer, any change in the car-no, no, and no. I start in on the couch cushions when I begin contemplating ruining Eden's childhood and spoil the magic of the tooth fairy and tell her the cold, hard truth. Then I remember that Britta has some money in a jar in the laundry room...crisis averted.

NOT EVEN A WEEK LATER!!!!!

Eden lost her top tooth and again was extremely excited, and I thought to myself, well at least this time I know I have a dollar in my purse, whoo! So the day goes by, evening, kids in bed, I lay down to read a book and was so tired,fell asleep. Next thing I know, it's 6:45 am, and I hear Eden in tears talking to Ben while he's getting ready for work telling him the tooth fairy didn't come. SHOOT!!!!! Granted I was up a few times through out the night with Weston, and I should have remembered then, but I was only awake by the most technical sense of the word. Ben and I tried to smooth out the situation and told her we were sure the tooth fairy would come that night. All day, I kept reminding myself to put the dollar from my purse under her pillow. Well, I leave for a meeting, come home, go to my wallet to get out the dollar and it's not there!!! Oh that's right, I had to use it to donate to Eden's class for a book fair! So Ben goes to the store, 10 at night, to get her her favorite candy bar and it puts it under pillow. All is well.

Now, I know the easy and responsible solution would be keeping extra money on hand, but that would involve an extra errand to the bank or actually remembering to get cash back at the grocery store while I'm shepherding three kids past the candy section, loading grcoeries in the cart and telling Weston, "It's okay, we're almost done, hang in there buddy." Why oh why didn't the person who created the tooth fairy have a clause built in to make it easier on parents: "The tooth fairy will come within 1-3 days from the time the tooth came out."

Update on Weston

Weston is 5 and half months old!! He is rolling all over the place, sitting up on his own, and loves to gnaw on our faces. Eating is his favorite hobby, followed closely by drooling and excels at both. While he's pretty satisfied with strained peas, we can tell he's looking forward to using his two new teeth to their full extent to sample the food on our plates. He laughs and growls and blows raspberries and is a ton of fun to play with.

"...and just like that, our cat days were over...."

If you've seen the movie Forrest Gump then you will probably remember Forrest's transitions between phases of his life began with "and just like that" and ended with "my ______ days were over". And just like that his shrimping/army/running/etc. days were at an end. Two weeks ago, we realized our cat days were over.

Two Saturdays ago we returned our two cats Pepper and Piper to the adoption agency where we got them. Almost a year to the day that we got them, we passed the joy of pet ownership on to another cat family. We had been talking about doing this for the past six months. We'd offered to friends and neighbors. We posted on Craig's List. We'd even talked about just leaving the door open and letting them wander out 'on accident'. Fortunately/unfortunately, our consciences wouldn't let us go with the last option. So, we contacted the adoption agency where we got the pets and told them we were bringing them back.

Stephanie and I waited until the last minute to break the news to the girls. That Friday night we gathered the girls around us and informed them that in the morning we were going to take the cats back so another family could enjoy having them. We were completely unprepared for the responses we got:

"All right! I HATE it when they jump up on my bed at night!" (EDEN)
"Yeah!! No more cats!" (BRITTA)

Stephanie and I were rendered speechless. We were ready to launch into all of the reasons why it was not a good idea to keep the cats any longer only to find that the girls were already in a heavenly orbit anticipating total cat-less-ness. There was nothing more to be said.

The next morning we loaded all the cat paraphenalia and the two cats in the van and took them to the adoption agency. There were not really any questions asked. We left feeling like we'd just avoided another potentially uncomfortable discussion. We spent the rest of the day cleaning the house and vacuuming cat hair off of everything. At the end of the day, floors and counters were gleaming, and the smell of cats was completely absent.

In the two weeks since the cats have been gone, we only remember the cats fondly. No feelings of guilt or regret. I mean, come on - no more scooping the cat box!! No more watching to make sure the doors don't get left open. No more cats pawing you in your sleep. No more scratching of our couch. No more fur balls underfoot as you turn a corner. No cat food on the floor. AND we were able to reclaim the second bathroom. Truly, our cat days are over.

Normally we aren't able to walk away from our obligations this easily. So, we keep wondering when the other shoe is going to drop. So... is that it? Is it really just this easy? Based on our experience, YES!!

The Joy and Joyness of Buzz Word

During our Anderson Christmas Extravaganza of '08 I fell in love with a game called "Buzz Word". Perhaps it was just the people I was with(I miss you all so much!) but it was ridiculously fun to play and compete, and I told Ben I wanted the game for my birthday. Well, wonderful man that he is, he got it for me, and now I want to share it all with you! So, each week depending on how on top of things I am (don't hold your breath) I am going to post a Buzz Word Round. For those of you who have never played: There are ten clues. The "Buzz Word" is part of the answer to the clues. For example, Buzz Word is apple. Clue #1 is " The object of my affection. Answer-Apple of my eye." Clue #2 "Lump in a man's throat. Answer-Adam's Apple." I'll post one from the easy and hard categories. Feel free to post your answer in the comments section or just enjoy the mental exercise.

Buzz Word is "First"
1. Current commemoratives issued for stamp collectors
2. The ship captain's right-hand man
3. She resides at the White House
4. On the active roster of the football team
5. Foremost in quality
6. Attention is given in the order of arrival
7. Captain Picard battles the Borg in this Star Trek movie
8. Rod Stewart's heartbroken song
9. Rambo movie
10 What comes before your surname

Buzz Word is "Not"
1. Ripley's...
2. Gone, but
3. Unequal to a rose-colored penny
4. It doesn't end until it ends
5. Rolling Stones', "Love is love..." song
6. Inequitable
7. Les valuable than a pile of garbanzos
8. Verse spoken while plucking petals
9. Waste not...
10. It isn't Armegeddon

Do You Like Things?

Every once in a while I like to ask the girls a slightly off question or ones that makes them think outside the box. Their answers give a little insight to their personalities or as you'll see with Avery, insight to how their day is going. The question I asked recently was "Do you like 'things'?"

Avery: "I do not like Britta! I like mommy and daddy, and Eden, and Weston and food. But NOT BRITTA!"

Britta: "Yeah, sure." (My easy going child)

Eden: "What kinds of things?" (My very analytical child)

My Britta Bee

Playing with Britta is like performing a play without a script, and yet you're expected to know your part. Britta was apparently given the script and knows how it's all supposed to work, but I just can't seem to keep up.

Example 1:

Britta: "Mom, look the pig (imaginary mind you and completely invisible)is stealing the pie! She climbed on the table and jumped up to the counter. She's running through the market!!"

Mom: "Oh,no! Someone should stop her!"

Britta: "There, I fought her and took the pie and put it on the roof."

Mom: "Well, what if she gets a ladder and takes it again?"

Britta: (looking at me as if her suspicions that mom doesn't know anything have just been confirmed) "Pigs can't climb ladders."

Example 2: (Britta is pretending to be a dog)

"Look mom, the dog is walking to the door. Look, mom the dog is going out the door. Look mom, the dog is looking around. Look mom the dog sees a bird. Look mom, the dog is barking at the bird. Look mom, the dog is chasing the bird."

Mom: "I see doggy. You went out the door and chased the bird."

Britta: (sighing to herself) No, mom, I saw the door, then I went outside, then I looked around, and THEN I saw the bird. I'll show you again."

Mom: thinking to herself that she'd better go get a notebook, pen, and advil.

Example 3:

Britta: "I have free water for sale. Do you want some?"

Mom: "FREE water for SALE?"

Britta: "Yeah, do you want some?"

Mom: "Sure I'll take a cup."

Britta: "Kay, that'll be 4 dollars."

Mom: "But I thought is was free."

Britta: "It is."

Mom:....