"Never let a Polish woman into your house..."

"Never let a Polish woman into your house" that's the latest advise from Bogda. Polish women are mean and will harshly judge your housekeeping skills, decorating choices, and attempts at parenting. Noted. The other day I found myself defending Kitty's choice in befriending a shy little girl whose family just happens to be from Mexico. Bogda doesn't trust very many different ethnicities and I sometimes have to remind her that some of her ideas are not accurate, let alone nice. I was losing the battle and in my desperation I said, "What if someone said all Polish people were horrible, nasty people?" She quickly responded, "They are." Case closed.

Have you met John?

You may have seen us struggling through a meltdown in a public place.  You may have even been that person who asked, "What is wrong with him?" as I strong-armed his intentionally limp body off the ground. Or perhaps you watched from afar wondering what a great big boy like that was doing screaming, yelling and flailing like a two year old. Chances are we got your attention.

Sometimes I am the soft spoken, patient mother who quietly escorts her angry son away, but mostly I get angry and embarrassed myself and try my best imitation of the stern, no nonsense drill sargent.  Neither tactic works, by the way.

My biggest fear? You thinking you could do better. I'll admit, I've thought this myself about you and your children. But that was a long time ago.

Did you know I hate it when your child gets called names just because they happen to be in the right place at the right time? No amount of apology or shrugging of shoulders makes up for ugly words targeted at your child.

If you look closer you might see I'm doing my best and that what comes out of my son's mouth is only a reflection of his internal struggle.

If you look closer you might see a boy who is unsure and anxious. 

A boy who desperately wants to be accepted by his peers. 

A boy who ironically hates the spotlight and would like to blend in.

A boy who likes to laugh and have fun, but who finds it difficult to lighten up and let go.

I love this boy.

Oh my Chickie!

Chickie is 8 months today.

This baby likes to move and I had a hard time getting her to sit for the mandatory picture.

Although she is not yet crawling, we are working on a few signs so that she can be ready to read by the time she turns 1.  As you know, it is important to rush these milestones. My goal is to have her eating cheeseburgers by next month.

I've seen this look before...



Pointing to the baby's eye (she's brilliant by the way).



Which of these hands doesn't belong? I had to force her to sit back.



This picture makes me laugh, I caught her in the middle of making her funny face where she scrunches up her nose sniffs. 



My cutest girls.

 

Karma Chameleon

Yesterday the sun was shining but the wind was bitter cold.  When I got the kids from school I almost froze to death.  Because I had to park a block away I made everyone run to the car.  The spontaneous jog felt good. "I need to do this more often" I thought. "I hope I'm not going too fast for Kitty" I worried.

As we climbed into the car and caught our breath Kitty said, "I'll bet that was the first time you've ever run. I mean, besides when you go to aerobics."

As sad as that made me, I couldn't feel too bad.  You see, when I was just a little older than Kitty, I made a comment that has haunted me to this day:  "I didn't know you could run," I told my dad after I watched him play softball.

Do I believe in karma? Did Boy George wear lipstick?

Chia seeds, bed bugs and bullies

Following the latest nutrition trend, I bought me some Chia seeds.  They are supposed to be good for more than just harvesting your own batch of tacky decor.  I put them in my smoothie-- my green smoothie. The seeds grow a membrane when wet and they get slimy.  I was picking Chia seeds out of my teeth and washing them out of my sink all day. Beth said they look like bed bugs. I would like to suggest that not only do they look like bed bugs, but like bed bugs they are impossible to get rid of, they are full of protein, and don't taste all that good. I keep trying them and have come to the conclusion that they suck.

After two suspensions, two days in the Principal's office, and a bout with a pretty bad virus (all within the past two weeks), John has once again landed on the school attendance "watch list". I don't know what this means except you get a phone call and a semi-threatening letter.  What am I supposed to do? Send my contagious son to school to lash out both verbally and physically so you can suspend him again? It's a vicious cycle and I've toyed with the idea of updating the Bully Blog... but that takes time and effort. Time and effort I should be spending teaching my son not to draw pictures of cutting off the substitute teacher's head (he's so creative).

I've also been thinking about adding a new pin board on pinterest called "The stupidest pins I've ever seen" but then I might offend some people and give others the wrong idea about me because as much as I hate to admit it, I care what people think (kind of).

Kitty designed her own 100th day shirt, made with 100 bells. She actually likes school, go figure.

Snidely Whiplash

John likes to Google.  He likes to find cool pictures and use them as his profile for his school class chatroom.  He's found all kinds of cool giant squid pictures, don't ask me why, but he likes freakish sea creatures. 

We have a rule that no one Googles anything without permission. But rules get broken (by John).

Today I noticed a website saved on my desktop.  I clicked it to find this picture of a "bad guy" connected to a blog written by a self-described Single Manhatten Homo. I was a little concerned about the content of the blog because there was a liberal amount of swearing, but knowing my son, I am pretty sure he was only after the picture (right?). 



I decided to post this picture of Snidely Whiplash* (the "bad guy" who brought all this about) so if John Googles it again, maybe he will be directed to my blog instead.



But here's my true confession.  Maybe it was the sparkling, glittery header, the witty descriptions, or the alternative lifestyle, but the Single Manhatten Homo pulled me in.  I paged through a few posts and decided that, despite the language barrier, Single Manhatten Homo was pretty funny and entertaining. He described his latest break-up. It is so hard to be friends after you break-up, we've all been there, you just can't do it.  I could relate to his critique of Los Angeles. I was as suprised as he was when his "very Asian" friend from New York showed up at a restaurant in San Fransico. I liked that he called his group of friends "the divas".  He likes to tan, I like to be tan.


The End.


*Only someone like Jared would actually know this cartoon villian's name.  Bonus points if you know which cartoon he's from.

Snow day love

I love snow days. Especially when they fall on Fridays. Woo hoo, bring on the long weekend.
I love that it took me the entire day to clean the kitchen, and that it's still not finished. 
I love getting everyone dressed in snow gear just to have them come back in 10 minutes later.
I love that I made lunch at least three times and by the time I finished the last request it was time to start on dinner.
I love the pent-up-energy-furniture-jumping and spontaneous doll drop-kicks.
The constant fighting, sarcasm, screaming, and random mouth noises are music to my ears.
I love that our dish can't hold a signal in the rain, let alone 18 inches of snow.
I love that a game of Yahtzee turned into a full blown temper tantrum (mine).
I love that Jared shoveled and you can't even tell.

I took a Just Dance 3 break and that may be the highlight of the day. It was the highlight of Chickie's day too, she laughed at me the whole time.

And Jared wonders why when John and Kitty went to bed with their pj's inside out and a spoon under their pillows (a sure-fire trick to summon a snow day), I made certain my pj's were nowhere near inside out and all the silverware was accounted for.