How Do They Do It?

I sort of single-parented this weekend. I say "sort of" because Fooz grabbed a couple kids Saturday morning and I blissfully only had two. Two toddlers in the grocery store and out-and-about is simply dreamy, by the way. Johnny and Gracie were divine. And another "sort of" is that my FRIEND, Joan, had all four at her house for more than several minutes while I ran home (we live across the street) and threw dinner in the oven. However, there were times this weekend when there was no back-up and it was not emotionally cool.

At one point Saturday night I had all of this happening at once, as we're going up to bed:

1. Lizzy putting on her very best throw-down-tantrum
2. Johnny dumping an entire box of tacks all over the middle of the floor (which meant I had to keep Gracie, Johnny, and Ainsley from running all over them)
3. Johnny crying because I yelled "JOHNNY. DO NOT MOVE!!!!" and freaked him out.
4. Ainsley crying because she managed to step on the lone tack that had skittered across the hardwood.

And I paused and wondered how people manage when it's just them and there isn't another adult around to help. Scenes like this are totally common in this house, multiple times/day. I would be an even worse mess than I am now if John wasn't around to share in managing the chaos.

So I tip my hat and throw out loads of respect to anyone who truly single-parents. I don't know how you do it without losing your mind or at least maintaining some semblance of dignity.

Pup-pee Dawoog!!!! (as miss gracie calls them)

Oh, how I wish we had a video monitor for the triplets' room. The conversations I hear when they're supposed to be sleeping, the shrieking, the "One, Two, Three, GO!" followed by jumping and laughing...I would give anything to see what is actually going on. I'd like to know who really is the one who wakes everyone up, which ones staccato-kick their beds, the leader of my lil' packages of sweetness.

The other day I heard them chattering as they woke up from their nap. Then silence. Then laughter. Then...woofing? Seriously, they were all taking turns going "woof, woof" and then all three would bust their guts.

I lurked outside their room for a couple minutes and then entered to this:

The Boy.

Gracie with her classic smirk.

Lizzy, who is usually the one I hear laughing hysterically. If you ever need to feel funny, hang out with this kid - she'll laugh at just about anything.

And just because she followed me upstairs to see what the ruckus was about...

All of them had their stuffed dogs "woofing" at each other and, apparently, it is the funniest thing ever when one is 2-and-1/2.

I am not looking forward to the days when they are no longer confined to their cribs.

Dress Up

It's very important to my oldest and she is trying (not always in vain) to expose her siblings to the joy. We hear "who wants to play dress up!??!?!?" often and you will see that her brother gets pretty fired up about it. Poor guy. I told someone the other day that he will have no sense of pride by the time his sisters get done with him.

The Queen, as herself.

Normal.

As "Tinkiebell" (as Tinkerbell is called in our home). "I'm flying! Look at me! I'm flying!" (what she was running around, saying)

A rare moment - catching Gracie with a smile on her face. The kid smiles (smirks, actually) a lot - it's nearly impossible to get on camera.

And then there's the pink bunny outfit. Poor guy. He was so excited to put it on, too. Buddy, at least I didn't put in the princess dress pics...

Yeah. That's It.

I was unglamorously trying to squeeze myself into some spanx this morning and, of course, had an audience. I always have an audience. For everything. At least Ainsley is finally at the age where if I say, "mommy needs some privacy for just a little bit", she gets it and is not offended. The other three get seriously frosted at the suggestion that I'd like to be by myself for 3 seconds.

Well, Lizzy was the lucky one intently watching me doing the deep knee bends necessary to don the "shapewear" (which doesn't work THAT well, trust me - now I'm questioning why I even bother with the stinkin' things). She was staring and staring until a huge smile took over her face and she announced "Mommy's doing ballet!!!!". Whereupon she started to do plie's and saying "I'm doing ballet, too!".

Ballet. That's exactly what I was doing.

Things To Fling - April

I've been in a fairly good mood lately, so I only have one thing to fling this month:
icky super-short running shorts. After a junky winter, the local runners are gleefully abandoning their treadmills and exposing their lily-white legs (and other body parts) to the rest of us.


The shorts are from the early 80's (you know, the ones that are REALLY short and aren't connected on the sides). They look like this:



Unless you are a true elite, you have no business wearing these shorts. I don't care if you consistently win in your age-group, you have no business wearing these shorts. And if you haven't seen your 20's in 20+ years, you have no business wearing these shorts. Too much of your body is exposed...way, way, too much. My children and I should never have to see old hineys on our way home from the playground.

But then there are the moments of my day that make me forget about flinging. One of them recently arrived in the form of a little boy who wears his heart on his sleeve.

I realize the photo quality isn't fab, but it's his transparent joy that makes my heart ache.

Panic.

Johnny has escaped our yard twice now. The first time I completely freaked and ran faster than I have in ages yelling for him, feeling totally nauseous. The second time I knew immediately where to look. Why? He only has to negotiate a 4-foot fence to get to the only place he desires: the neighbors. Why does he love their yard? Because the two boys that live there are his heroes (they treat him like gold - they give him whatever he wants and carry him everywhere). There are toys over there that only boys love (my girls like them, but not on the same obsessive level as their brother). And there is one of those super-nice swing sets with a ladder to a fort. A fort with boy things in it - like a pretend snake and a firetruck and other...stuff.

One of his heroes (who had just lent my adoring child his shades - hence the big smile):



And how does he get there?? He easily climbs up the side of this play set and then somehow (since we haven't seen him do it) shimmies down the other side.


Yes, yes. I know. We should move the play set. The problem is, the space where we have it (plus the other gear) is narrow and slopes on the other side. And we can't just move it a couple feet from the fence b/c I know my child - he will try to scale the thing anyway and then a bigger accident may occur.

All I know is, and my boy knows it as well, there will be big, BIG trouble if it happens again.

Field Trips

We have a really nice butterfly house in our area and there's talk about taking the kidlets. I'm not so sure. The main reason is that my sweet and very sensitive boy likes to stomp on things. This is what boys do. Plus, I'm always telling him to "Be my big, brave boy and stomp on that bug for Mommy". I didn't think for a skinny minute this could be a problem, because one of my kids needs to be taught how to kill things that freak me out - what would I do if John was out of the house and some spider was stalking the family? Someone has to squish the horrid thing and it certainly isn't going to be me.

So I was showing the girls some crocuses that were just popping up and they were appropriately ooh-ing and aah-ing over them. Then Johnny stopped by for a looksie and, after I repeated "look at the sweet little flowers!", he appropriately (in his mind) tried to stomp on them. As I said earlier, that's what boys do. But if his response to something pretty like these:


is to smoosh them, what's to keep the child from extinguishing an insect this beautiful?



Knowing my luck, he'd probably do it in front of some little school children...or start a chain reaction among his siblings and it would be like a horror-show grape-stomp and we would be forever banished from the butterfly house.

Decisions. Decisions.