There’s gonna be a wedding.

Mar 7, 2012

My children married a fish and a lizard this afternoon. Without further ado, I present to you The Wedding of Fish and Sticky Lizard:

Fish: I wuv you, Sticky Lizard.

Lizard: I love you, too. I want to marry you.

Fish: Awwwwwwwww. You do?

Lizard: Yes.

Fish: But, we can’t. You’re………….a Mommy!

Lizard: And you’re a Daddy.

Fish: Yeah………

Lizard: Ok. Look at me in the face. Now we are married.

Fish: Yay!

********

Just so you know, I am going to start demanding that people “look at me in the face” at random times.

Waitress: Hi! Can I take your order?

Me: Look at me in the face. I would like a Diet Coke.

********

Child: Mommy, look at the the animals!

Me: Zebra. Look at me in the face. I would like to take your picture.

********

Saleswoman: That’ll be $24.35

Me: Look at me in the face. That’ll be $5.00

Saleswoman: Uh………I don’t…….

Me: Face. Mine. Look at it. $5.00

Saleswoman: M’am, it’s $24.35

Me:………….Look at me in the face. Now we are married.

Saleswoman: I’m calling the police.

BOOM! We're married, y'all!

What exactly are you talking about, Willis?

Mar 5, 2012

Some things you say and see mean startlingly different things before and after you have kids.

• “I am going back to bed.”

          Before kids: I am going back to bed.

         After kids:  What do you mean you’re going back to bed? What’s wrong? Did someone die? Where are your kids? Did you win the lottery? WHAT IS GOING ON? I AM FREAKING OUT HERE! NO ONE JUST GOES BACK TO BED!!!

• “I can’t take it anymore.”

         Before kids: You should think about talking to someone. Do you need help? I’m worried about you.

        After kids: You and me both, man.

• “I’m going to the bathroom. Anyone want to come?”

         Before kids: I am going to the ladies room and want to talk shit about someone or something. Who’s in?

         After kids: I am going to the public bathroom. If I go by myself, my children will freak the fuck out. They will also decide halfway to grandma’s that they need to go number 2 and we will have to use a fast food restaurant bathroom that someone recently died in. So please, come poop with me.

• A woman in a parking garage buckles her kid into his carseat, closes the door, looks at you, and starts pretending to pull her hair out.

         Before kids: You avoid eye contact and wonder if you should call CPS.

        After kids: You give her a pat on the arm and tell her to hang in there, because this day too shall end.

• You bought the latest gadget. Your friends say, “Wow! That is really cool!” You say, “Yeah, you’d think so…………”

         Before kids: But it runs too slow, the battery doesn’t last as long as you thought………

        After kids: There is a serious design flaw that my children have discovered and exploited to the fullest extent. As a result, this thing has made my life hell. Do not buy one, my friends. Do not buy one.

• “If you don’t start behaving, I am going to put you in time out!”

         Before kids: Prelude to sexy time with boyfriend.

        After kids: Just stop. Just. Stop. I am so tired. Don’t make me come up with a punishment. Just……..stop.

• A mother scolds another woman’s child.

         Before kids: Well! What a busy body. If I were that child’s mother I would be deeply offended!

        After kids…….and it is your kid being scolded: Oh thank god. That little bastard sure as hell won’t listen to me. Takes a village right? GIVE HIM HELL, SUSAN!

Them’s good eatin’.

Feb 9, 2012

Meal time with the twins makes me feel like a waitress at a downtown Applebee’s when there is a convention in town.

“MORE MILK!”

“MORE POTATOES!”

“I NEED SOMEONE TO CUT THIS!”

“I NEED A NAPKIN!”

“I’M STILL HUNGRY!”

(They do say please and thank you, by the way. Sometimes.When we remind them. We’re working on it, people.)

And boy, do they resent it when we tell them to get something for themselves! You’d think I’d just asked my 4 year old to re-upholster the sofa. The best response so far? “My legs don’t work!!!” Really, child? Really?

Different moms I know handle this different ways. Some decide to eat later, since they aren’t going to get a moment to sit anyway. They hang out kid-adjacent, watching You Tube videos or reading Sheep! magazine (real magazine) until they are beckoned. I’ve done that. Others grab themselves a plate, have a seat, and when their kids start making their endless demands these Moms simply look at them with a raised eyebrow and ask them if plan to tip the usual 20%. I’ve done that, too.

I realize that my children are at an age where there is not a lot they can do for themselves due to height restrictions and lack of coordination. But sometimes you can prep for dinnertime like the Bar exam and still not cover all the bases. You put extra food on the table. You leave the jug of milk on the table. Everything is cut up into appropriate sized pieces and everybody has napkins. And STILL, they will find something that requires you to put down that delicious forkful of yum and go fetch.

I honestly don’t know how they manage this. When I sit down for a meal, I am pretty much set for the duration. I don’t want a different color fork. I am perfectly happy with the size and shape of my food. I don’t really need to have water, milk, and orange juice for beverage options. And more often than not, I don’t require extra napkins because there is mac and cheese dribbling from my chin, down my shirt, and onto my pants.

And all this is not to mention the sheer volume of food these children take in. They weigh about 40 pounds each and easily eat at least that much weight in food a day. The other day, we took the kids to the park. We got in the car, the kids asked for some food (as they do), and I opened up the back pack my husband had packed with all the snacks in it. I turned to Mike and said, “Honey, where are all the snacks?” He said, “What are you talking about? I packed two snack traps.” “Are you for real, dude? Two snack traps? You do realize we will be gone for upwards of an hour and a half, right?” “Yeah?” “Have you met your children? Turn around, we need more food. TURN THE CAR AROUND!!!!” Well, it went something like that. But the man was a fool not to pack at least a half day’s worth of provisions for an hour and a half trip. For serious, people.

Silly thing to bitch about? Perhaps. But if you don’t know by now, I am both petty AND crazy. So there is a lot of senseless bitching going on. Senseless Bitching would be the name of my band. If I had a show dog, its name would be MerryWeather Gobbler’s Senseless Bitching. Title of my autobiography? You guessed it. It also works as the name of a southern estate, boat, or production company. Tell me I’m wrong. You can’t.

Your threats do not scare me, small person.

Jan 26, 2012

Right now the kids are going through a love affair with threats. Oh man, do they like to threaten us. Their threats, however, just leave mommy and daddy perplexed.  These kids are PATHETIC at threatening. Just TERRIBLE.  Here’s a car-versation the girl and I had on Monday:

Mom: “Guess what I did while you guys were in school? I went to the store and ordered the cupcakes for your birthday party!”

Meg: “I want to see my cupcakes!!!”

Mom: “Well, you can’t see them yet, honey. I just ordered them today.”

Meg: “No, Mom. I mean I want to SEE them with my EYEBALLS.”

Mom: “Yeah, Meg, but the problem is that they don’t exist yet. We don’t pick them up till the day of your party.”

Meg: “FINE. If YOU don’t let me see my cupcakes, then I won’t eat ANY cupcakes!!”

Mom: “……….uh…………what?”

Meg: “I’m not gonna eat ANY cupcakes EVER!”

Mom: “Um…….Ok? I mean, I guess if you don’t want to eat any cupcakes then you can certainly make that choice.”

Meg: “FINE!”

She totally doesn’t get it.

Ben is no better at this.

Ben: “If you don’t come downstairs with me right now, then I am NEVER going downstairs AGAIN.”

Mom: “Er. Alright then. I just…….you know, that’s fine.”

Or just yesterday, when he was punished with not getting to play Lego Indiana Jones that night:

Ben: “If YOU don’t let me play Indiana Jones, then I won’t play it for the rest of the entire DAY!!”

Mom: “You seem to have a firm grasp of the situation Ben.”

Ben: “Nooooooooooooooo!”

Sad stuff. I actually can’t think of a threat they could make that would make me nervous. NO WAIT! I just did. If they threatened not to sleep. This is what is happening on the inside of my head when I think of them not sleeping when my strong preference would be for them to be asleep:

That’s probably the one thing they could say that would bend me to their will. Please don’t tell them I said that. Nobody likes a snitch.

The kids don’t really have an adult to model themselves after when it comes to quality threats. Threatening is probably one of my top three parenting tools (I AM AN EXCELLENT MOTHER!) but I am not particularly skilled at it. Ask Mike. He will tell you at length how terrible I am at threats. It is one of the few things that he really gets on me about (that’s what she said). The kids will do something rotten, and I will go, “If you do that again………….no more (whatever it is) for the rest of the week!!!!” Mike will just stop and look at me and go, “Really? REALLY? Can you do something a little more immediate? Do you really think that 5 days from now they are even going to remember this conversation?” He has a good point. Time is not my children’s strong point. They routinely wake up from a one hour nap and ask what we are going to do on this brand new day.

Mike is consistent in his threats. He sticks with the tried and true, “Do it again, and you’re going in time out!!” Some might say he is a one-trick pony, but that person would certainly not be me. My first instinct when I am about to make a threat is to say whatever is going to make them cut whatever they are doing the fuck out. My reasoning is — if it’s a good enough threat, then I won’t have to enforce it. If I just pick the right one, those guys will fucking Riverdance right into line. See? Here’s Ben and Megan after I threatened to take the cookies out of their school lunches:

You have to admit, this is solid reasoning. The one flaw in my plan is that one of these days they will call my bluff. I will say, “If you guys don’t stop, then we are NOT going to go on our play date!!” And then they will do it again. And I will be faced with the idea of canceling a play date and staying home for the next three hours with two angry children who I now have to entertain. Or……OR………I could act like I am feeling incredibly benevolent that day and give them “just one……more……chance!” Yeah, that’s it. If I weren’t in such a charitable mood, we’d be sitting at home playing Jail for the 50th time today. But because I am such a sensitive, forgiving mother, I will give you another chance and we will go play with some other children while their mother and I drink coffee and bitch about all of you.

I AM AN EXCELLENT MOTHER!

By the way, in case the word “jail” caught your attention, let me explain. It is a game the children quite enjoy. I am Sheriff Mommy, and Ben is Bazooka Ben, and Megan is the terrible criminal that keeps escaping from jail. Ben and I then have to chase her down and put her back in jail. We can do this FOREVER. I really get into my role. I walk with that wide-legged, just-got-off-a-horse stride, I call Megan a varmint, I am quite the little Yosemite Sam. And Ben pretends to shoot her with a bazooka. I don’t know. It keeps them busy.