Perftic garlicks....

Yesterday I unexpectedly had the day off (the boys were sick - or Dawson was anyway). I loaded up my kids and a picnic lunch and took them to a park in a neighboring town. I'd always wanted to check that park out because a. it had woodchips instead of sand and b. it just looked neat. It was neat. It has a toddler area with slides and steps in mini size that was just right for Colby to play on without help. The bigger kid area had 3 slides (a tie with swings for Kailin's favorite) and a "ladder" (those convex metal bar things that function as a ladder but look a little different - hard to explain I guess). Kailin loves the ladder at our park, but it's only 3 feet tall. This one was 8 feet tall to connect with the platform near the tallest slides. I am proud to say that Kailin ran right over to it and climbed up without any trepidation! She proceeded to go down all the big girl slides without anyone to catch her, and also told me to go play with Colby while she played in the big kid area. Where is my baby?? She's getting to be such a little grown up.

After our lunch and some more playing (read - it was WELL into "heading rapidly toward the wall" time) we left the park and I was secretly planning to stop at McDonald's for ice cream for the kids. As we drove up, Kailin spied it and said, "Can we go McDonald's - get some ice cream?" and I said yes. She said (in disbelief), "Can we??" and I said yes and she yelled, "That would be PERFTIC, MAMA!!!!!!!!" The ice cream plan was indeed "perftic" til we left and Kailin caught her toe in the parking lot and did a full out Superwoman onto the pavement. She howled and howled her pathetic overtired, scared, I need my mom howl. I snatched her up and brushed her off and kissed her skinned up knee and promised a bandaid when we got home. Luckily she's a tough kid and that did the trick.

I've also been meaning to blog about the garlicks. We have a year round garland with white lights in it right at ceiling level in our living room. It used to be a Christmas thing, but we like it and it's homey and there you have it. It hasn't been lit regularly since we unplugged the carefully orchestrated symphony of plugs from our Christmas village. The garland gets plugged into it somewhere in the middle (can you tell I share no responsibility for it's setup?!). Anyway, Kailin thinks the name of it is "garlicks" even though she knows what garlic is in the kitchen as well. She's forever saying "Daddy, can you light up the garlicks?" and I always have a mental vision of some sort of garlic bomb or maybe a garlic candle... neither is appealing.

Riddle me this...

Okay, one more post for the day. I haven't given a riddle in a long while. If you ask an almost 3 year old and an almost 4 year old to choose a cup from the following colors - yellow, orange, or purple, which color(s) will they choose? You're thinking I'm going to say that they both chose orange or purple or even yellow aren't you? Wrong. One chose green and the other chose blue. Seriously people. WITH A VISUAL!!! "Green is not an option. Would you like yellow, orange or purple?" "Green." From the other one, "And I want blue!!" I give up!!!

I think a little....

Apparently I only think a little. Despite having proofread my post the other day about our picnic, upon re-reading it this morning (yes, I do re-read my own blog sometimes - when I'm looking to brighten my day with tales of good times had by all or "it was much worse than this when...." scenarios) I discovered the following phrase, "While cutting up a watermelon it dawned on me that if we were headed to Harrington Beach State Park for our walk, perhaps a little impromptu picnic." Perhaps a little impromptu picnic what??? Would be nice, would be in order, would be fun, would be insane? WHAT?? Well, I'll tell you what - you choose because they're all applicable as it turns out. Ha ha ha. Just had to put that out there. I guess my remaining six brain cells were all busy with something else when I typed that.

And now, the wonder twins are both crying, so I'll have to go. Dawson is crying because Colby bopped him with a Princess Genevieve cell phone and Colby is crying because I took it away. A beautiful day in the neighborhood!!

Corn Dracula

So I posted that we were all headed for some ice cream after the kids woke up. Not so much. Kailin declared that she wanted to go to the park. I told her we were planning to go for ice cream, but she was adamant about the park. I told her she could go to the park, but then there would be no ice cream (and I have a horrible admission to make here - I slanted the decision entirely toward the ice cream which is much to my horror. Instead of being ecstatic that I have a kid who would rather do something active than go for ice cream, I push her toward something entirely unhealthy. When is my Mom of the Year Award going to arrive??). She was fine with that. In the end, my wonderful husband ended up taking both kids to the park while I slept off my headache. I need to remember that one the next time I'm annoyed that he didn't clean up the dishes or remember to put jammies in the diaper bag for the kids. They showed up in time to make dinner and I learned that they had a fabulous time (Colby tried charcoal and sand - turns out neither is particularly appetizing....).

Last night we had what I'd like to call the "All American Supper". (Yes, I shamelessly ripped Denny's off there. If our family ate faster I'd have gone whole hog and called it a Slam.) We had hamburgers (on the grill), baked beans, cucumber salad (a summer favorite of mine) and corn on the cob. YUM!!!!!!!!!!!!

I gave Kailin her half cob and Colby was all over it. Pointing, shrieking...the whole 9 yards. I figured I'd let him give it a try and see what happened. To say that Colby loves corn on the cob would be the understatement of the century. The boy was all over it. He snarfed down his first half cob and then bellowed loudly anytime anyone else at the table had any. We gave him a second half cob and he shrieked something terrible when Steve took the EMPTY cob away from him. We've deemed him "Corn Dracula". Anytime Steve approached his chair with the corn, he would open his mouth like a little bird and then lunge forward for the corn before Steve could even get it anywhere near his mouth. It was hysterical to watch! If you visit us this summer, request that corn on the cob be on the menu. The dinner theater is worth having to pick your teeth for an hour afterwards!

Meanwhile....anytime you take a picture of Colby, Kailin will chime in.... "picture me!!" I was trying to "picture her" last night at dinner and all she would do is give me this cheesy grin showing ALL of her teeth. I tried to tell her to smile "regular" which then got me the non smile. Finally, in desperation, I made her laugh in hopes that I could get a "real smile." Third try's a charm, I guess!!

State of the kitchen....

I feel like I should give a "State of the Kitchen" address sometimes. I mean seriously....my life feels like it revolves around the welfare of my kitchen.

For instance, Friday's address would have sounded like this..."Well, we've been tuned in on the environmental needs of the kitchen and as a result the countertops are clean, the sink is sparkling again, and we are in a state of general organization. In whole, I think we can be very comfortable with the state of the kitchen and move forward into the weekend."

This morning, however, would have started more like "With a heavy heart I report that the kitchen is in a state of utter disarray. The countertops have been declared a federal disaster area and are under quarantine pending a major reclamation project scheduled in the next hour. The sink is experiencing the aftermath of a grape jelly spill and will need our full attention as soon as we are able to offer it. We would like to offer you hope in this hour of darkness, so we are happy to report that the food particle problem that was plaguing the floor has already been eradicated as a first step in our reclamation plan."

And who decided that some kitchens should have two ovens? A great plan, if you ask me, but shouldn't our first focus be on equipping kitchens with multiple dishwashers instead? I mean really...I literally just emptied our dishwasher and now it's nearly full again. It's not like we stacked all of yesterday's dishes on the counter or anything. I'm just talking about HALF of the dinner dishes (and pots and pans) and this morning's dishes. That's it. We don't have a particularly small dishwasher or anything - so clearly there's a need.

I'm happy to report that I have indeed reclaimed the kitchen and am feeling better about life in general. I won't even go into what the living room looks like. It's not a pretty picture!

Just a walk in the park....

Today was gorgeous. Although it was cloudy when Colby and I got up at 5:30 (leave it to him to awaken early on the one day his sister sleeps in a bit....), it was soon sunny and warm. My plan was to get up with Kailin and head out to the grocery store while Colby and Steve slept. Obviously that was shot to heck. ha ha. Kailin was up by 6 and by 6:45 I had them both ready to head out. Steve came down about that time and I did the cowardly thing and stuck him with Colby. Kailin and I set out and were back by 8:30! Hooray!! Looking forward to a long day of freedom ahead (astutely having busted my butt last week during naps to get the lawn mowed, the laundry done, and the house cleaned to allow us the guilty pleasure of having "nothing" to do this weekend), we arrived at home and I unloaded the groceries. While cutting up a watermelon it dawned on me that if we were headed to Harrington Beach State Park for our walk, perhaps a little impromptu picnic. I commenced to making up sandwiches, cheese cubes, crackers, and watermelon and portioning them out into ziploc bags and containers in the perfect sizes for our idyllic family picnic.

Steve made a pitcher of lemonade. This is of little consequence except that this is what I heard while I had my back turned cutting up the melon.... "What is this?" "It's the pitcher." "Why does it stink?" "It doesn't stink." "Yaaaaaessss. It IS stinking!!" She was talking about seeing the powdery stuff rising up out of the pitcher apparently, but her extended yes and her use of stinking somehow tickled my funny bone and I was laughing uncontrollably. She said it with such conviction in her voice. I wish you all could have heard it!

After Colby finally got up from his morning nap (read - when we gave up on him waking up at a reasonable time on his own and woke his sleepy butt up at 11am), we joyfully loaded the picnic, dog, and two kids into the Jeep and headed off for our adventure. A blissful ride to the park was followed by a joyful walk around Quarry Lake. We then returned to the car, spread our tablecloth on the grassy knoll, and enjoyed a peaceful and tasty meal together before heading home for some much needed naps (needed by all, actually taken by only the children).

Here's what really happened...Kailin was entirely uncooperative as we tried to get ready to leave (including throwing her brother's sandal and having a tantrum because her stuffed dog couldn't come with us). I forgot sippy cups for the kids and we had to turn around and head home for them. When we did finally get going, Kailin and the dog whined loudly the entire way to the park. I didn't hold out much hope for a calming walk. My hope fell further when the distance from the car to the trailhead was filled with...."Where's my picnic? Do you know where my picnic is?" Thankfully, I was wrong and the walk was actually entirely peaceful with Kailin playing a rousing game of "let Daddy get ahead and then run to catch him." We looked for fish in the lake and a group of little girls let Kailin look at the frog they'd caught. We did make it back to the car for our picnic only to discover that someone else had staked out the picnic table we'd been hoping to use (our options were somewhat limited with a dog). We plunked our tablecloth down right on the grass in front of the Jeep and I set about making our picnic as nice as possible. Steve and Sugar discovered that the pump hadn't been turned on yet and so we had one seriously hot dog and no water for her. Kailin was obsessed with not allowing the wind to blow any of the edges of the picnic cloth up and Colby set about cramming as much sandwich into his face as was physically possible. Idyllic, huh?

Seriously though, once things calmed down a bit, we did have a great little picnic and it was a lot of fun. The whole thing was fun - just in a much more realistic (much less idyllic) way.

The kids are both still sleeping as I write this, but after they wake up we're all going to McDonald's for ice cream. Kailin's been asking all weekend, "Can we go McDonalds? Get some ice cream?" so I'm glad to be able to tell her yes. She's getting to an age where she truly enjoys asking for something and then getting to do it. And I get the pleasure of seeing her delight. Win win if you ask me.

This day of fun has reminded me how blessed I am to have such a wonderful little family and how blessed we all are to be able to go where we want when we want and say what we want while we're there. Without wanting to wax philosophical or sound cliche, I am thankful on this Memorial Day that there are men and women who are willing to risk their lives to keep this country free. What a gift we have in this country, and in it's people.

And now, I think I'll take a little nap while the kids finish theirs. Save that, I hear Colby...

Yes Mam!!!

Bet you all thought that was a spelling error on my part. Nope. I did really mean "yes Mam!" because Colby finally took a full blooded American pacifier!! After I just asked a friend who's traveling to Taiwan in a week or so to pick some more up for us if she could find them (my attempt at getting him to switch a week or so ago was met with much ANGER including trying to forcibly rip the new bink leash off of his shirt!), he bit through the one I just gave him two days ago even though I started giving it to him only at naps and bedtime. That leaves us with just one more Chinese bink and over two weeks til we might possibly have some more. Drastic action was in order! I detached his "old new" bink from his favorite bink leash and attached the Mam one and clipped it on. He recognized the foe from his previous encounter and forcibly (there were teeth involved!) inserted and removed it from his mouth about 7 times. He examined it closely, put it in my mouth a couple of times, and then put it back in his own and left it there. Hallelujah!! I was seriously concerned about the quality of life in this house if we had a bink incident with no solution in site (or in country!)! He's had the new bink for 24 hours now and is doing fine. It is somewhat of a testament to Colby's temperament. He is very fiery on the surface, but in the end, he's a reasonable little guy and accepts his fate if he sees that there's just no way the battle will be won. He's no pushover, but he knows his limits. He also figures, I think, that anything attached to the end of the beloved bink leash can't be all that bad. Ha ha.