Love For Big Kids

There are a lot of people having babies around here. Ok, women having babies, but sometimes I need to remember why having bigger kids are SO much better than babies. There really are a quite a few reasons they a super cool. Babies are cute, cuddly, have that just hatched smell, stay where you put them, don't sass talk, and are basically blank slates to be taught. But, the slightly older kid has some true advantages.

1. They can ASK for what they want instead of screaming like a banshee (most of the time anyhow).
2. They can pour their own drinks and *mostly* not spill.
3. They can drink from real cups, eat from real plates, and use real utensils.
4. Nap time is gone and you don't have to rush home at 1 to get them in bed just to be thwarted when they dose off in the car and will never fall back asleep once you get home. (No nap is also a con, BTW.)
5. They come up with some of the most bizarre stories which is more amusing that most shows on T.V. now.
6. They aren't a drowning risk in the bathtub any more. (Unless they get rowdy and need to be clubbed like baby goats.)
7. Logic starts to work as a reason why things must or must not be done. 
8. Each kid is developing their own personality and it is fun to figure out each new person as they grown.
9. Free Slave Labor!
10. They can swallow pills! You no longer have to try to get Motrin in them like they are a feral cat.
11. No more formula. That stuff is expensive and stinks!
12. They remember things from day to day, week to week, holiday to holiday. While for *cough* some of us this is a detriment, it's kinda fun to have traditions and habits with them.
13. They can amuse themselves outside in the fenced in yard by themselves. Not having to sit outside when it's 103 in the summer or -3 in the winter when they want to go out to play is HUGE.
14. They can dress, undress, and go to the bathroom by themselves (mostly).
15. They can buckle their own seat belts.


There's more. I'll make more of a list when I can think of them all!

T2 Is 6!

My little boy is 6!! (Ok, technically he will be on Wed., but this is close enough because I have a few minutes now.)  We had a cute little party for him on Sunday and while it was smaller than usual, it went very well. The kids all got along. There were no giant fits, fights, squabbles, yelling.. It was actually pleasant! We missed a few dear friends, but hopefully we can get together with them in a few days for a play date and see them to say hi (HI!).  I can't believe how big my wee boy has gotten. He was SO tiny and now is reading, writing, adding 2 digit numbers.. He's turned into a whole little person.

This year T2 went for a "Zelda" theme at his party. I must admit this made the cake a little *special*. I was aiming for a Triforce cake. It was a little lopsided and lumpy, but it tasted SO good! It was humid the day I was making it and the cake was just too moist it couldn't stay together.

Mostly, the kids just ran around outside and played together. But they did SO well. They really are just the best kids. They have a fantastic bunch of parents.

Just a few of our friends that came, I wasn't able to get everyone - kids tend to run at the slightest thing you know!!

And of course T1 was the Most Fantastic Sister Helper. She even made T2 one of his favorite breakfasts of blueberry muffins all by herself (except the oven part of course). They were absolutely delicious! So proud of that wee girl of mine too!

Born On Date

So I've been a little delayed posting, but eh I'd say it's because I'm busy, but mostly I've become slightly absorbed with my new Ipad and it's hard to type long things on it. You know, new toys and all. But, T2 was working on his school work this am and one of his questions was "When were you born?" He comes up and asks me. I KNOW he knows his birthday so I ask him what his birthday is and he says "April 25th". We go back and forth for about 3 rounds because apparently "born on" and "birthday" are NOT the same.  I then had to spend about 5 minutes explaining that BIRTH meant BORN hence BIRTHday. Apparently both 1 and 2 never made that connection before.

This is Bear now at 11-ish weeks sitting with T1 about 3 days ago. He's gonna be a big boy!

I'm also going to be posting pictures of the newly painted bathroom. It was hideous. I'm not sure why we hadn't painted before now. It's been 7 years of hideousness. But a day and a half of effort and it looks SO much better. We are planning, at some point, to do something with the pink-ness of the tile, but that's a much bigger project - and expense than just some paint. But we fixed the plumbing for the shower (which has apparently been broken the entire time we've lived here) and that left a giant hole in the wall. So I fixed that and then it needed to be painted. Sad, I know, that the plumber duct taping part of the wall together is what it takes to get something in my house painted. But I got enough paint to get the back bathroom done too.

Knee Surgery

Just avoid it. Knee surgery is evil - a necessary evil in some cases - but evil none the less. I had surgery on my left knee last Friday. Today the thing is still swollen and looks like someone took a bat to it.

And this it looking *better*.  And yes, it DOES look like it has chicken pox. Those are hives. I have hives all over the front and back of that leg. Just THAT leg. The kids have been remarkably good about letting me rest it. They've stayed on task, for the most part, with school. They've not watched excessive amounts of T.V.  They've helped out a ton with puppies by letting them outside and feeding them and the kittens. They can get their own smaller snacks and drinks with only minor spillage which they attempted to clean up by themselves.

So for the most part the kids are doing fantastic with it. *I* am exhausted from it hurting constantly. And I admit I've been impatient and probably doing more than I should with the darn thing since it still won't bend well because of swelling. Buuuuuut you know there are certain things around the house that won't do themselves and after a week I get a little antsy. I have read 6 books. Seriously. 6. I stole C's nook that I got him for Christmas because I kept running out of library books and started downloading free ones. Today, I borrowed some from my friend N because she had the last book in a serious I've been reading and well.. I wanted it like Gollum wants that darned ring. So I sit with some Lipton Diet Iced Green Tea and some Caramel Rice Cakes and a giant ice pack on my knee and some painkillers and read. I've done this for 7 days straight now.

The one positive thing from this is both kids curl up near me (although they do have a healthy respect for *away from the leg*) and read chapter books too. T1 has gone through 2 Babysitters Club books and T2 has gone through almost every single boy book we have in the house. We need to get him some harder Boy books. I just didn't expect my 5 year old to be on a 2-3rd grade reading level so I figured we'd have more time. Guess I was wrong. Although of all the horrible, tragic things to be wrong about, I'll take it.

OKC

A couple of weeks ago we took a short weekend trip to Oklahoma City. It was mostly a "let's do something fun before the suckfest of knee surgery" trip. Now that we are fully in the Suckfest that IS knee surgery recovery and I don't have a lot of things better to do than sit here on my behind and elevate the knee that won't stop swelling, I figured I'd go ahead and share the pictures from OKC.

We stayed at a fairly cute little hotel with a nice little pool for little kids. Unfortunately, several of the other guests thought this meant that they could just let their kids do whatever they wanted. It drove me absolutely insane. C was nice and took 1 & 2 to the pool and let me go to the fitness center instead after that first time. The pool wasn't very deep either, since it was targeted for littler kids. The kids liked it though - I think *I* may have been the only one not in love with the pool. But they had LOTS of amply sized towels, a little slide, little water falls. It was very well maintained, I just have a thing with pools. And being cold and wet.

The first day we went to G.W. Exotic Animal Memorial Park. It's about 45 minutes out of OKC, but very much worth the drive AND price. We took their tour and got to pet and play with a baby tiger, a baby bear, a snake, a giant tortoise, camels, goats, baby alligator and 2 hour informative tour where they fed the big cats and bears and stuff. VERY, VERY much recommend it. The guy who runs and owns the place is apparently getting ready to have his own nationally run show about building zoos or something like that.

This is a mean monkey BTW..

And for as much as everyone *Hates* Walmart, they donate all of their meat they can't sell. Which apparently is A LOT.

Anyhow. Go there if you can. It's cool. There is nothing to seperate you from the animals but a thin chain link fence. Literally. Soooo. Hold on to your meandering kids. .. Like T2 who actually leaned against the tiger cage and shoved a hand in and leaned just absent mindedly because he does that and gave the keepers a coronary as a jerked him 10 feet back so that the tiger didn't eat him.  (They train them to take meat from the keepers from between the chain link slats. It's a big bad no no to touch the cages.. Tigers will eat you..)

 We also went to the Museum of Osteology on our way back to the hotel that day. It was really pretty cool and presented MUCH nicer than I had anticipated. 1 and 2 both thought it was really neat!

Because if there's something to stick his head into, he's gonna do it.

Anything he can do, she can do better..

We headed back to the hotel after that, we all got tired. Well, not too tired to swim of course. They went and swam, I did not. It was cold. We ended up having cheetos and chocolate milk to go with the traditional Family Movie Night for dinner that night because we couldn't figure out what else to have and we were all tired after swimming. 

The next morning (Sunday) we all got up, had breakfast, they went swimming and we loaded the car and went to the Science Museum a.k.a the Omniplex. I don't have pictures of that because we've been there a couple of times and I was feeling lazy. We stayed a few hours there and headed home to play with the puppies and kittens that were played with all weekend by my mom. 

Everyday Learning

I like to think that everyday I learn something new. Like today, I learned the helpful little lesson of: Take your pain pill BEFORE you do your range-of-motion stretches. Assuming  you've just had surgery on your knee that is. You probably, in general, don't need to just randomly take narcotic pain medication to make your leg straighten out. Well, YOU might, but *I* usually don't. Soooo 4-5 days after knee surgery, take those drugs first, then work on straightening that sucker out a few times. NOT before. You will be a sad, sad panda.

Another great gem? Teach your kids to not 3-hole punch food. Mine currently are blaming "No One", but I'm pretty sure a piece of bread didn't hole punch itself.

These 2 hooligans are so helpful sometime with learning lessons..

Oy Vey, Children and their Antics

This week the kids have been super duper extra creative. The weather has been extremely gorgeous for this time of year and they've been spend a giant portion outside with New Puppy "Bear". (Yeah, I know - but that's a separate post and pictures will be coming - but he's SOOO cute!) Well, while 1 & 2 have been outside they've been up to quite a few umm.. Antics.. If you will.

1. The Glue Slide:  They procured 2 big bottles of white Elmers type glue, opened them, and poured them ALL OVER their outside slide. (In literally the 3 minutes it took me to go to the bathroom.) When I discovered their Glue Slide (that they were sliding down, none-the-less) I MAY have shouted through the door for them to get to cleaning that up before it dried into a giant never to be cleaned up again mess. I started lunch. I look back out the window and BOTH kids (yes, I do have a boy and girl BTW) are completely naked peeing on our tree stump. So, back out I go to find out exactly WHY they are naked (I'm just assuming they are peeing on the stump because they are naked already and had to pee..) and I get this answer. "Well, you told us to clean the slide, so we took this bucket and poured water on the slide and have been sliding down and washing it off with our belly. But our clothes got wet and that was uncomfortable, so we took them off and THEN slided down."

So basically. Just to clarify. They took off all their clothes to wash off the glue on the slide with their naked bellies after pour buckets of cold water down it. I can't "argue" because they were doing exactly what I said to do. And yet. OMG. It then became "Bath Day".

2. The Rock Catapult: 1 & 2 were outside again playing. #2 comes in sobbing. I go and see what happened and who did what to who (because someone always did something, but usually the crier did something too..) And The Boy sobs out, "I got hit by a rock." I repeat that back to him because really? He got magically hit by a rock?? And then the REAL explanation comes. "Well, I was making a rock catapult and I was putting a really big rock in it and I missed and the rock fell and hit my leg." 
Because I'm more amused and curious at this point I just HAVE to ask, "Why exactly are you making a rock catapult?"
The boy looks annoyed at me and says, "Because the dogs really like it when we throw rocks at them so they can eat them."
We now have a No Rock Catapult For The Dogs Rule.

He cheers up quickly after than, then shouts as he's headed back towards the door to his sister, "Hey, Let's start working on our slingshot since Mom said no more catapult!! I bet we can make it work REAL good for some of those big rocks!"


3. Stick Ball:  Once again, 1 & 2 were outside. (I know you'd think at this point they'd be forbidden.) I hear #2 sobbing again. He comes in escorted by his sister. I ask what happened since he's holding the side of his face. #1 starts explaining that *all* they were doing was playing ball. Ok. So why is he crying? And. Wait. You didn't TAKE a ball outside. She then clarifies they MADE a ball and she threw said ball and he MISSED catching it and it hit him in the face. So, I ask, what was this *made up ball* made of? Sticks. They made a ball of STICKS. Now, how much trouble can I get either of them in when 1 in already injured, and the other honestly can't figure out why this is wrong? She said she was sorry and put herself in time out for a few minutes. But she really thought it was a *Good* game.

So now. We also have a No Playing Catch With Sticks Rule which goes with the No Making Balls With Sticks and just in case it was unclear the No Throwing Sticks At People Rule.  I had to go with the trifecta rule because she honestly didn't see why throwing a Stick Ball at her brother's face what a *bad* plan.  And darn it all, I like his eyes intact!


Now, just so you don't think I'm this lazy parent that shoves my kids outside for hours on end and doesn't watch them and they just go and cause trouble. I DO let them go outside and play by themselves now, but they are 7 and almost 6 in a fully (relatively) inescapable yard with a privacy fence that we've mostly *kid proofed*. There are obviously sticks and rocks, but not much else. I check on them at least every 3-5 minutes and you know, if they get into trouble within 3-5 minutes with sticks and rocks, they are hell bent on getting into trouble and gonna do it anyhow. They may as well do it in MY backyard where I can band-aid them back together and tell them not to do it again. Most parents now don't let their kids out of their sight to play outside at all, and while I don't let them go into the front yard or the street or to the neighbors house - they can have free rein of their backyard.