time for school!

I'm a bad mom. I admit it, I am SO READY FOR SCHOOL TO START. And I'm pretty sure my kids are ready. We're at the end of our 'bonding' rope. We've had togetherness. And now, time for them to GO TO SCHOOL.

This is how I know it is time.
At the beginning of the summer, the kids liked each other. (and I liked them) They played games together. They talked. They watched TV. They made plans for vacation.
Now they're starting to say things like: "Mom, she keeps looking at me."
or, "Mom, he won't stop breathing."
Looking and breathing are not optional.

I just caught my daughter chopping something up. A banana. Because the dogs might like a treat. THE DOGS DO NO EAT BANANAS. They've never eaten them. How bored do you have to be to think dogs eat bananas?

And worse, I've realized I kind of like watching Wizards of Waverly Place.

home is where the dogs are

This is me, after the RWA. Happy to be home with the 4-legged kids who never argue, fight over who gets to sit in which seat of the van, or complain about what's for dinner.

Of course my human kids don't piddle on the floor.

spa day

I had a great time at the salon yesterday. My family gave me a gift card for a spa day. Massage, pedicure, manicure, facial. It was wonderful, relaxing, and everything it should have been.

Back to the facial. I'm sure I look younger. But the 'slight tingle' she warned of was actually a horrible burn that felt like jalapeno juice being poured in an open wound.

That's how I described it.

So why did my daughter announce at VBS that I had a great time, but the facial was hotter than (insert certain very hot location).

Yes, she did that.

a day in the life

What do I have to do today. Finish information on cover art for March 2010 book. Work on edits. Next book is due in July. Vacation Bible School in June. If I was a man, I'd be overwhelmed, but i have the wonderful ability to look at what needs to be done, including cleaning house and doing laundry, and convince myself I have six months. So let's drink more coffee.

I always have time to mess with my kids. Kid 2 is the easiest to mess with, which is why that kid is the subject of more posts. My husband says that kid 2 "is going to need a good job to pay for the counseling."

His new obsession, dryer lint. Why? Because he's doing his own laundry now and I clued him into the fact that you have to clean out the lent trap each time you do a load. "Why?" Kid Monk asked.
"Well, because lint is flammable."
"FLAMMABLE!"
Yeah, well, I mean, it isn't going to just catch on fire, but it does have to be cleaned out from time to time.
This is better than the elves that made shoes. My lint trap is getting cleaned in the middle of the night while I sleep!!

I should tell him that dishes left on the counter and clothes left on the floor are prone to spontaneous combustion!

SICK KIDS SHOULD SLEEP

I'm at home with my middle kid...who claimed he was too sick to go to church. And I'll give him this, he did have a fever last night and this morning. Unfortunately now he's feeling much better. He's playing XBox and he wants money for points. I think I've spent enough on him in the last month, and he's the most expensive kid I have. He says that is because he's awesome.

I hope someday he'll get over his self-esteem issues. (JK)

The biggest problem with kid 2 being home: NON STOP TALKING. and now he's singing..
and it isn't good singing. I think it's something like, 'blame it on the ahahahaha, blame it on..agh.'
The dog howling at the alarm clock isn't as annoying as this kid's singing. It's a good thing he's smart, because the whole singing thing is not going to work out for him.

And that takes me back to...isn't he supposed to be sick? Because if he was truly sick, not that I want that for him, but if he was, he'd be quiet. He'd take benadryl and sleep. I'd be sympathetic and bring him water, or crackers.

But when he sings, sympathy is out the window.

getting stuff done

Today's schedule. I need to finish edits on my September book, work on a new proposal, do laundry, dishes and unpack more boxes. Six weeks in this house and we're still surrounded by boxes. Yes, the procrastinating life sounds great, but in the end, the mess has to be dealt with.

Now if everyone will cooperate. That means: no phone calls needing my presence elsewhere, kids coming home on the bus and not needing the mom taxi. Basically life needs to be as abnormal as possible today.

What would be a great help is if the dogs would cross their legs and stop whining to go outside.

Oh, and I need to turn off the computer and leave it off.
right......

WIRE HANGER MOMENTS

I would love to pretend I'm the perfect mom who never loses it, is never responsible, in the least, for the counseling her children will need in twenty years. The truth is, we all have WIRE HANGER moments.

NO, I don't mean we beat our kids with wire hangers. What I mean is, we all have that moment when we're pushed too far. We lose it. Our normally kind, patient, mommyself is lost to BAD MOM WHO HAS PMS, RUN FOR COVER....
It starts with: "Mom, come here, I need..MOM, where are you, Mom, I said.." or "Mom, he won't let me..."

Remember the scene in MOMMY DEAREST when Joan Crawford goes into the kid's room in the middle of the night and she finds....WIRE HANGERS.
OH NO, not wire hangers.

She loses it and yells, NO WIRE HANGERS. I don't think I enjoyed that line as much until I saw it again in Diary of a Mad Black Woman. Tyler Perry is a genius. Oh, sorry, sidetracked.
The point is, it wasn't the wire hangers that made Joan lose it. She'd already lost it at that point. The wire hangers were the 'last straw.'

My children sometimes push me to 'wire hanger' moments.

If someone tries to convince you they never have wire hanger moments, well, I don't know what to tell you. I can only tell you this, I'm a good mom, a good Christian, and I have wire hanger moments. That's reality and I think that we should be honest with one another. If we hide behind a mask of perfection, saying that we're perfect, our children are perfect, our marriages are perfect, then some young mother out there is having wire hanger moments alone and worrying that there's something wrong with her, that she's the only one losing it from time to time.

Oh, look, one of my little offspring has sneaked out of her hiding place with a note to tell me she loves me.
NO WIRE HANGERS!!!

MIA: Smart, Witty and CREATIVE

I'm not missing in action, just moving and writing. It is true, when it rains, it pours. I'm trying to finish a book, a novella, and move. All at the same time. So, 'witty and smart' are MIA.

On the UP SIDE, American Idol, still entertaining. Three people of the twelve who sang are going to make the final twelve. I, of course, am a Danny Gokey fan. I also like the little girl with pink hair. I won't try to remember her name because I can't.
Remember, I'm moving: witty and smart are MIA, and I have so much writing to do, creativity is MIA with them. Or maybe Creative took Smart and Witty and led them away with the promise of cookies and coffee?

My kids haven't even been cute, smart or witty lately. To be honest they've been kind of a pain. I know, no one else has experienced those moments when you really do want to stand them on the street corner with some kind of sign tied to their necks. I haven't done it yet, but I think if I ever want to be a Fox News Alert, I might try it. How about a sign like, "My mom says I have to stop fighting with my sister. OH, and check out her new release, A COWBOY'S HEART."
Why didn't I think of that earlier?

Oh wait, kid one was incredibly witty...never mind, I can't repeat that.
Here's one I can repeat.
At work one of the girls told him that he's cute. He's a short kid, just over five feet. She told him, "You're so cute, I want to take you home with me. Oh wow, you're travel sized. I could take you anywhere."
Don't worry, he loved it. He has a great attitude about life. He's short, but he's also alive. He'll take short.
I think there's a lesson in that: about life, faith and accepting our circumstances.
THE END.

American Idol, How sweet the sound?

No Balmy Florida here. Or coffee. And a certain someone seems to want to rub it in that it got down to a freezing sixty degrees in Florida today.
I'm not holding grudges, but she also has coffee, and I'm out. That might be the last straw.

But on to brighter subjects. American Idol is back, with Simon's sharp wit still with us, dashing the hopes of talentless children all across the country. I love that man.

And kudos to all of the loving moms out there who keep telling their children they are the future rock idols of the world, while oblivious to the reality that their children can't sing. Thanks to you, moms, grandmas, aunts, uncles and best friends, we are entertained for hours each week as some poor dear child gets her self-esteem cut down by Simon's English wit.

This really isn't funny, it's actually very sad. We want to encourage our children, tell them they are the best at everything, want them to succeed in every direction they turn. Reality TV has brought us to this place in our lives where we believe that every child can be a superstar with little or no work on their part. Sometimes with no talent. And in the end...Simon calls MOM onto the stage to ask her why she encouraged her child to sing.

DON'T LET THAT BE YOU!

It is time to be honest with our children. "HONEY, I love you, you're a genius at math, but YOU ARE TONE DEAF so please stop singing. Can't you see that the cat has lost all her hair?"
The words sound harsh, but do you really want to be the parent watching this episode of American Idol on TV as your child screeches a song to the idle judges, realizing with a sickening feeling in the pit of your stomach that your child can't sing and now the whole world knows?

Worse yet, singing in a superhero costume.

Let's put the word 'no' back in our vocabularies. Our kids deserve it.