Caviar and Armpits

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Well, this week was a grand week.... if chaos = grand!

I made a huge batch of Vegan Texas Caviar (recipe HERE) at the beginning of the week. Every time I had the munchies or skipped lunch I grabbed for the bowl of caviar and the bag of tortilla chips.

Then there was a day that Izaiah flipped out on everything and I mean everything. And the dog decided for the first time in her 6 years to start dumping and eating the trash every time I left the house.

The Butterfly Girlz are making their mark on our facebook page - I am astounded at the conversations and support they are offering up. These girls were divinely chosen and they are going to rock this world! I am humbled by them!

I had a great day of cleaning - my husband actually gave me the "to what do I owe this honor" face when he walked in from work. That face was followed with the "that's pretty sexy" grin! LOL
One day I crawled back into bed at 8:30am when the last of the three kids got on the bus and I slept for 3 more hours. It was heavenly.

This week was a silly mommy week - I felt like I goofed around with the kids more than usual and we all had a blast. There was hose play and sidewalk chalk in the driveway, tickle fests, jumping out and scaring each other and lots and lots of hugs.

My newest tattoo finally stopped itching so badly that I want to take my arm off.

I celebrated a life long friend's 41st birthday and found out a college friend's wife has stage 3 ovarian cancer.

I heard Michele C. Scott, author of Praying Through Your Adoption, speak and cried my eyes out when she talked about Post-Adoption depression and low self-esteem.

I wrote and organized the beginning of my book for teen girls and found out how passionate my husband is about this project. This could be a really good match - he and I and a book to inspire teens.

I watched way too much devastation in Japan.

And today we made an early morning a trip to Urgent Care to dig 1/2 a tick body out of Izaiah's armpit and send it off to be tested for Lyme's Disease.

My little buddy and I travelled all around after his "pit" felt a bit better (with the help of two....yep, two....donuts) to find a very special baptism gift for Matthew. Izaiah was a beautifully behaved little boy - at ALL 5 stops we needed to make. I was so proud of him!

As she headed upstairs to bed, Emily had memorized 106 decimal places of Pi. You know, we all know Pi is 3.14 but Emily now knows the next 104 numbers as well. She's got about 300 decimal places to go - we will see how far she gets by Monday. So proud! Gotta love a good gifted kid!

Matthew will give himself to the Lord this Sunday in a public testimony of his faith.

Now, there are three ways to end a long list of chaos and the beginning to a beautifully amazing weekend!

Peace out, Mamas!

Inside the mind of a CEREAL SMASHER...

(this is another re-run from 2 years ago - enjoy)

"My name is Michelle and I am the mom of a cereal smasher."

(insert AA-style greeting here, "Hello Michelle!")

I don't pretend to understand the goings on in the cerebral cortex of someone under the age of four. I can't tell you WHY they do the things they do. But I would pay for someone to tell me HOW TO MAKE IT STOP!

There is something evil and twisted lurking inside the skull of he who is three.

This morning as I cleaned up milky smashed cereal pieces with a snow shovel, I pondered why anyone would feel the need to smash their breakfast into every crack and crevice of their favorite press-the-button book. I am certain it does not do much for the acoustics of Thomas the Tank's whistle...the little blue train gurgled and growled at me with each swipe of my dish rag.

I wonder about his mind...his tiny little ABC-reciting, I yuv wu Ma-saying mind. WHAT.IS.HE.THINKING?!
Now, I don't believe that all three year olds compose devious plots against the sanity of their moms. I have three kids and neither of my other children tested my need for Xanax like this one does.

What possesses a child to open the heating vent and shove 13,000 hot wheels inside?

Where in the pre-schooler handbook do you smile sweetly at strangers and then hand them your boogers?

In whose mind is it a good idea to rub cold oatmeal deep into the fur of the dog while Mommy is on the phone?

And...in what far corner of his mind do the synapses tell you to feed a pack and a half of Dentyne to the dog?

Then there is the oral fixation....everything goes in the mouth! EV.ERY.THING!

While most children go the picky-eater route at some point, this one....this one has an expanded palette that includes items you wouldn't find in the slop the farmer feeds Templeton and Wilbur. We are talking dog fur, bird poop, rocks, dirt, coins, pushpins, hairy lollipops, someone else's gum, sand, mulch, hard shards of cheese from the dustpan, the juice from a kidney bean can scavenged from the recycling bin, tissues and coffee grounds.
Yum! NOT!

Of course, the destruction and deviant digestion of a typical day is enough to having me peeling my eyelids off before lunchtime, my sanity (or lack there of) eventually comes down to how many temper tantrums I deal with in a day.

I remember seeing the tantrum of a friend's child and thinking, "Wow! She needs to get a handle on that behavior! That is ridiculous!"

But, recently, as I fought for a week to get my son's flailing legs into the leg-holes of the basket portion of the shopping cart while he beat the daylights out of my head with a monster truck, pulled my hair and shrieked as though I was sticking pins under his fingernails, I thought of my friend and her little angel who whined for .7 seconds when it was time to leave our playdate.
I have been banned from WalMart until further notice.

And when is it OK to bash Mommy in the back of the head with the MarioKart steering wheel?
 "EXCUSE ME for nodding off for a mere second during your 106th attempt to NOT be in 12th place!"

If anyone knows a good book about raising a CEREAL SMASHER... please forward the info.

Or....maybe I should write this book... then I could hire a maid to clean up the crumbs and pay for a therapist for me and my oatmeal-soft, minty-fresh dog.

Peace out, Mamas.