Girly-girl

I have been somewhat dismayed lately by how girly Marxo seems to be at the moment. Everything has to be PINK, she has to wear dresses all the time, and she loves all that Disney Princess crap.

However, last night, my heart was warmed...

We were sitting on the floor of their room, reading books. The girl was sitting there nicely, following along with the book when, a couple of minutes into the book, she innocently leaned over, raised one butt-cheek off the floor and let out a big ol' fart.

Then she laughed and laughed and laughed - and the rest of us did, too. :)

Jungle Animals

Yesterday at lunchtime, I went to Target to start gathering things for the girl's PINK birthday party. Any time we asked her what she wanted to do for her party, she said she wanted a PINK party. With PINK balloons, PINK cake, and PINK balls. (I still don't know what she means by pink balls, but we'll work through that...)

Anyway, whenever I go to Target, I have to swing through their dollar section to see if there are any good toys for us to take along to use as diversions at restaurants when we go out to eat. I found a package of "Jungle Animals" and thought that could probably provide at least 2 minutes of uninterrupted time, so I got it.

There are twelve "jungle" animals in the package. I don't remember them all, but among them were: a lion, a cheetah, a giraffe, a camel, a moose, and a polar bear. Hmmm...

Marshmallows

Well, school has begun for us again here - preschool, that is. And with it has come some interesting behavior.

I was really looking forward to school starting again because Fellan has been talking about it a lot during the summer. He loves his school, it's been really good for his social development, and I thought it would be just great for him to be back in school.

However, let me give you a little taste of what it's like to live with a highly sensitive, emotional, determined (aka stubborn), and slow to accept change little 4.5 year old boy.

I was late getting home from work one day and I got an agitated phone call from my husband. "Where are you and when are you going to be home?!! I've gone downstairs to take a break from Fellan and I just can't deal with him anymore!"

He relayed to me the situation - out of the blue, Fellan decided he wanted to eat marshmallows. (where that came from, I have no idea - he doesn't just eat marshmallows on an every-day kind of basis!) Unfortunately, upon looking in the pantry, my husband had to inform the previously happy and well-behaved little boy that we didn't have any marshmallows in the pantry.

Apparently at that point, the boy's skull opened up and from it grew a creature so hideously upset that only reddened eyeballs and a screaming mouth could be seen. For at least 30 minutes, the boy threw a complete fit about the fact that we didn't have marshmallows. Other food options were suggested to him, but nothing would appease his hunger for marshmallows. After being unable to pacify this intense, sustained outburst, the husband retreated to the downstairs room to re-group.

I got home in time to go upstairs and find the boy beginning to calm down a little bit. By that point, he was in the stage of his tantrum that he needed to be hugged. He needs to be touched and held in order to calm down from such an intensely physical outburst. I sat with him and hugged him and tried to get him to talk to me. I knew that if I talked about food of any type, it would set him off again.

He finally calmed down enough for me to get into the kitchen, make him a quesadilla, take it out to him, set it in front of him, and move away quickly.

The boy doesn't like to be wrong. He doesn't like to be caught in a situation where he feels trapped by his emotions or his stubbornness. So, by putting the food in front of him and not saying anything, he could discover it and make the decision himself that, "Oh Yes! This is exactly what I need right now. Marshmallows? What was I thinking?!... Mmmm... yummy, cheesey goodness..."

There have actually been a few other seemingly irrational outbursts like this during the last couple of weeks. It coincided exactly with the start of the school year. You know, it's flabbergasting sometimes - the more we learn about this little boy, the more we need to learn! Whew.

I seem to recall being rather stubbornly emotional about certain things sometimes. Sorry about that, mom! :)

P.S. After calming the boy down and beginning to get on with supper preparation, I happened to look in the pantry and find a bag of marshmallows up on a top shelf with about 5 marshmallows left in it. I didn't tell my husband about the bag until a couple of hours and a couple of glasses of wine later...

I grew too much

One evening a few weeks ago, the girl met me at the door when I got home from work. She was in tears, saying, "I goo too muh! I goo too muh!"

I was still in "office mode" and was unable to switch over into "childspeak" quickly enough, so I asked my husband what in the world she was so upset about.

"She grew too much." My husband replied.

So, I turned back to the girl and asked her what was wrong. "Mommy, I'm sorry! I grew too much! My shoes don't fit anymore." *more sobbing*

This is really my fault - I keep telling the kids that they can't grow anymore. That I love them just the way they are and I don't want them to grow up. I think I've even asked them to promise me that they won't grow too quickly.

I had to explain that it was OK for her to grow and that's what she's supposed to do and that we'll just have to buy her some new shoes.

She perked up immediately. Little drama queen!!!

Inspiration?... Anyone?...

I haven't posted anything in a week and a half - I guess I've been waiting for some kind of inspiration. It hasn't caught me yet. I don't know why - I haven't moved quickly enough to get away from anything chasing me in at least a week and a half...

Anyway, the only life update I have at this point is that I actually accomplished something at work this past week, so it has inspired me to start tackling some things at home. Like trying to clean some things out of this place. Oh! And I actually cooked a couple of things during the last week. That's fairly momentous.

Stay tuned. Maybe inspiration will track me down soon.

Mottos by which to live...

For years, I've had the following poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson (maybe) hanging in my office:

Success
To laugh often and much;
to win the respect of intelligent people
and affection of children;
to earn the appreciation of honest critics
and endure the betrayal of false friends;
to appreciate beauty,
to find the best in others;
to leave the world a bit better,
whether by a healthy child,
a garden patch,
or a redeemed social condition;
to know even one life has breathed easier
because you have lived.
This is to have succeeded.

However, after having children and determining that things are seldom as perfect as I'd like them to be (including my behavior when dealing with them!), I think I'm going to change it out for a very wise quote I just received by e-mail:

"If you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible warning."

Surely it's better to just set a lower standard than to continuously fail at perfection. :)

Random musings of a 4-year-old

Yesterday the boy was in rare form - here are some of his random musings...

Yesterday morning as I left for work, the kids had the following conversation (my husband text-messaged me as I was driving down the street):
the girl: "I wish... we'll miss her all day"
the boy: "We'll miss her all day... But we won't! After nap she'll come."
the girl: "I want to watch Calliou right now!"
(It's nice they think about me so fondly... and for so long!)

They then sat down to eat breakfast. And while sitting at the table, the boy says, "Daddy, you know what I really want is some attention" (pause) "but you're not giving me any." My husband said he thinks his reply was something like, "Hold on a minute - I want to hear what Cadel Evans has to say." - You know, an exciting stage of the Tour de France was going at this time! :)

The boy apparently then wanted Daddy to take him outside so he could check the weather. He got outside and declared, "Yep! Still summer!!!" and they went back inside.

And then last night, we went for a bike ride and Fellan was telling me all about how we would ride bikes when he gets older, "When I get older, then I could ride your bike. And Daddy and I could ride with the babies on the trailer bike."
"What babies?" I asked.
"The babies we're going to get!" he replied.
"Where are we going to get these babies?" I asked.
"From the hossibal! I know they make them there!" he exasperatedly replied.

(Lately, he's been obsessed with us having more babies - he wants two girls. Twin girls, to be exact. How long do you think it will take for his disappointment to fade?...)

Of course, the evening ended with him stubbornly refusing to brush his teeth and crying himself to sleep because we then wouldn't read him his book, but I'll try to remember the good parts of the day instead. :)

Mark my words...

For the last 8 years, the Tour de France has been won by an American. Last year's winner is still being questioned as a doper, however it remains a big question in my mind. The french labs that do the testing seem to be as reliable as a Yugo and I don't trust anything they say. I think they're still a little peeved that they've never been able to get any dirt on Lance, they hate that Americans have been winning, and they haven't had a French winner since 1985 - Bernard Hinault.

So, this year's Tour de France has been going on now for a week and the first big mountain stage was today. Everyone seemed to have a hard time coming up with the favorites for this year because more and more riders are being accused of doping and admitting to doping, but, even before the Tour started I figured out who the winner is going to be: Christophe Moreau.

Not that I like him at all. He's been a professional rider for 11 years and has been known to be kind of a jerk for most of his career. A few years ago, he was involved in a scuffle during a race and either punched another rider or got punched, I don't remember which.

Anyway, this year, he has become a "revelation". He won the French National Championship and the Dauphine Libere this year and I figure he'll probably win the Tour - he's French, he's probably doping (because, come on - at 36, he's suddenly a "revelation"??), but the French labs won't dare to "out" him as a doper.

So, there's my pick for the Tour. (do you think I could be any more fatalistic about this?...)

P.S. My real hopes for this year? Levi Leipheimer and Cadel Evans :)

I'm a "Fire Warden"

In my office building, every floor is required to have 4 "Fire Wardens" - people who check the floor during a fire drill and keep everyone on the floor until we're told to leave.

So, in case you can't find my office, just follow the gigantic arrow...


I just about fell over laughing when I came in one day to find myself "labelled".

Mini-vacation

Well, as if taking a week and a half off to go biking wasn't enough, we also decided to take a mini-vacation last week. My company only works 4 days a week and since the 4th was on Wednesday, I decided it was just stupid for me to come in to work on Thursday. I was having hard enough time trying to get back into the "work" mentality anyway!

So, we decided to take a mini-vacation out to Fredericksburg, TX. We were only there for one full day, but we managed to go hiking at Enchanted Rock for the morning, visited a winery (of course!) in the afternoon, and ate our fair share of bratwursts and German potato salad while we were there.

Hiking in a "valley" next to Enchanted Rock:


Our feet at the highest point on Enchanted Rock (surveyor's mark):

(notice the runnin' back shoes?...)