Mayhem and Motherhood

We're Not Autistic Anymore...

Someone was talking to me the other day telling me about services they had found for autistic kids and my mind started to wander. I was nodding and smiling, because that is what I try to do with people who attempt to be helpful, but I wasn't really listening.

I wasn't listening because my kids aren't autistic anymore. Well, ok that's not really true but I am in this blissful place where I get to pretend they aren't. It is only a moment in time and next week there is a good chance I will be telling you tales about how my oldest decided to pluck all his pubic hair out with tweezers or that my middle kid will never understand the concept of (insert any abstract concept here) but for the moment none of that is true.

We are almost normal. (Shhhhhhhhh! Knock on wood, don't tell the Gods....SHhhhhhhhh!)

Gift Giving Tips

OK, I am about to violate a major rule of the Women's Club.  Yes, for all of you men who have been wondering, there is a club. Yes, we have a secret handshake and instead of passing messages via carrier pigeon we pass them from woman to woman in restrooms all across the world--that is why we always go to the bathroom in pairs.

So anyway, back to the rule violation. I am about to give you just a little bit of insight into what makes women tick.

With the holiday season approaching, I thought I would offer up some tips to consider when purchasing presents for the woman in your life. Here they are:

1) Anything that cleans anything, is not a present. It is either a hint or an insult--scratch that, it is both.

2) Acne medication, wrinkle revitalizer, or anything of the sort is not a gift either. Refer to #1 to see what it is.

3) Money is not a gift because it was half ours to start with.

4) Men's robes and men's watches were made for men, not women.

5) Sexy underwear, leather thongs or setting up the video camera in the bedroom are gifts for you, not us.

6) Asking us what we want means you don't listen when we talk or you don't really know us or a whole host of other things that are very, very bad.

7) Almost everything advertised on jewelry commercials is ugly. Don't fall for the happy woman in the ad.

8) When we say we don't want anything or agree that buying something big for the house instead of exchanging presents, we don't mean it.

9) If you get a great idea--something that reminds you of when you were dating--make sure it was actually her you were dating and not the woman before her.

10) And the last tip is this: no, you can't get it right. No matter what you do it will be wrong and badly wrapped.

Chris

Growing Up and Moving Out

Well, it's here... sophomore year at Radford University.  This year is different, however.  This year, Megan has her own apartment... no more hot, sweaty, smelly dorm room for her...no sir'ee.  She has a four bedroom apartment with three roommates. 

Now, I don't know about ya'll, but when I first went out on my own, I had hand-me-down EVERYTHING.  The only new stuff I had were items I had collected in my "hope" chest from age 12.  Yes, I know, I'm dating myself.  No one has hope chests anymore.  Why should they when you have suckers like my husband and I for parents.

Several weeks ago, we took a trip to IKEA to pick up a bed frame.  We came back with a bed, a library table, a desk system, three lamps, silverware, various cooking vessels and utensils and other colorful essentials...not to mention a much lighter checkbook. 

Well, of course, we all know that you can't have a new bed without a new array of linens and coordinating accessories.  Off to Target we go.  Thank God for Target.  We picked up a new duvet cover with matching sheets, shams, pillow cases, rug, throw pillows and yes, the ever essential long body pillow.  So this was it.  This was the end of our furnishing of the apartment.  NO MORE.  Checkbook well is dry, right?...Wrong.  We wound up having to supply a dining set and microwave.  Well, they need a table to eat at and a microwave to cook in.  I mean, what's wrong with you people...don't you know anything?

Now we're done spending.  All is well.  Saturday we make the 3-hour trip to put everything together..set up and then get the hell out of there by 5ish, right?  Wrong.

Our little darling has a grocery list because her meal plan doesn't start for a week.  Yeah, OK, that makes sense.  While hubby is busy with the power tools, us girls head off the Wal-mart and the Dollar Store.  Between the two, we end up with trash cans, dish towels, oven mitts, broom, healthy food, not so healthy food, bake ware, sharp knives, first-aid stuff (in case she cuts herself with the sharp knives), glassware, curtain rod and the ever essential cookie jar.  OK, we all know a home is not a home without a cookie jar.

Shopping is done and upon return we find the bed is conquered and the desk is under attack.  One of Megan's roommate's parents are there tackling the construction of an entertainment center.  By 8:00 that evening, everything was constructed, cleaned and put in the appropriate places.  I even managed to construct a fruit salad for my child.  She does need something healthy to snack on, you know.

We bid our girl farewell, gave the usual kisses, hugs, tears and "I love yous".  Twenty minutes into our ride home, my phone rings...it's Megan:  "I'm coming home Monday for a few days, there's nothing to do here until school starts." 

Excuse me?.... how about finding a job.

Lisa

Getting Organized...

I mean it every time I say it, it just doesn't ever work out that way. This time, it's going to be different. This time I really am going to get organized. I'm going to get my life together.

A place for everything and everything in it's place. I'm going to start packing up the summer clothes but I'm not going to put the tops on the boxes because you just know the minute I do that the hot weather will return.

I'm going to give away the stuff that doesn't fit and that we don't use anymore and I'm going to remember where I put my receipt this year so I have it at tax time. Maybe I'll even get a filing system. Yes! I am definitely getting a filing system.

I'm going to make a list of chores the kids can do and stick to it even though it is quicker to do it myself. I'm going to get us on a schedule and no TV until your stuff is done.

I am going to paint the bathroom that has been primed and ready to go for about a year and a half. I'm going to scrape the peeling paint off the storm door--maybe I'll borrow the power washer from the guy next door and do it that way...Power tool babe---(Tim The Tool Man Taylor sounds here)

I am going to clean out my kitchen and stock my pantry, throw away anything and everything I haven't used in a year--which is pretty much everything in my kitchen--and cook like a crazy lady and stock the freezer.

I'm going to do all of this...just as soon as I take a nap. Thinking about all this work has made me exhausted...

Chris

All pray to the refrigerator god...

The refrigerator broke. It up and died during a thunderstorm and it never came back to life. This is just a fact of life, I know that, but it really seems unfair when it happens to you.

The last time the guy came to fix the refrigerator he told me, "Lady, this is it. I can't fix this thing anymore." So, when it broke, my husband and I stared at the checkbook, grimaced and I went off to buy a new one.

I walked into the store...(cue harp music and angels singing...) and there they were--nifty new appliances all shiny and clean and presumably functioning--just calling my name.

There was the stove that cooks things in half the time it would take you with a conventional stove because it circulates air in some new funky way--probably is operated by nuclear fusion--called my name but a look at the price tag made me lightheaded, so I moved on.

There was the washer and dryer that looked like something off the Enterprise, but I've heard that all those complicated computer buttons break and it costs you the same to replace the control panel as it does to buy a new one. They sure look cool though...and I really would like a front-loader...

I moved down another isle and found the refrigerators. I stood and gazed at the ones that look like a cabinet. They blend nicely and don't break the lines of the kitchen. They are SUPER COOL. Trouble is, I hate my cabinets. I really need to replace my cabinets. The trouble with that is that I have really expensive taste. I found these amazing cabinets...they are green and made to look antiqued and they have beautiful beveled glass and a warming drawer so your bread is always warm and a place to hide the bread with the roll top thing...they are BEAUTIFUL...trouble with that is they cost over twenty-thousand dollars. They are the reason I buy lottery tickets.

So on to the normal refrigerators I trudged beginning to feel just a little bit sick and tired of being middle-class. I stood in front of your standard white, freezer-on-top-fridge-on-the-bottom refrigerator. I looked to make sure it wasn't a Maytag because my cousin bought a Maytag last year and now she is on a first name basis with the Maytag Man, and decided yup this was the one...until, next to it, I spied the pretty side-by-side one with the...(cue angels and harps again)...ice maker and water thinggy.

I'd like one of those, I thought. Sure, you can't fit a turkey in the freezer but we have a freezer in the garage and besides I don't even like turkey all that much and it had an ICE MAKER.

We don't have ice in my house. I lost the trays and anyway when you fill them up they drip all over the place and who has time to think about ice? I never think about ice until I am drinking luke warm soda on a 97 degree day...actually not even then...I only think about ice when all I have to offer someone else is a warm soda on a 97 degree day...but an ICE MAKER would make that whole embarassing moment disappear.

So, I bought it. YEA ME! I mean I deserve a little ice, right?

They came and brought the refrigerator the next day and for only $150.00 more hooked up the ICE MAKER. Then we had to wait. You see it takes two days and eight million batches of ice to clean out the factory taste from the cold water and the ice.

For two days my kids said nothing but, "Can we have some ice now?" It was like playing the "Are we there yet" game on a trip from Maine to California. "No, not yet," was all I said through gritted teeth.

Finally, the day arrived. The ICE MAKER was working and ready to go. We all were drawn to the kitchen by the sound of music...AHHHHHHH...we admired the new refrigerator, bowed down before it and offered up a prayer and then...we all had a glass of water--with ice. It was a magic moment.

I looked over at my daughter and thougt that this was the beginning of something--that there was some kind of generational thing going on. I knew in that moment that I had changed her future. I knew that she would never own a refrigerator that didn't come with an ICE MAKER--although, probably in her world, it would be ice maker with small letters.

It has been two weeks and already the change is... ummm ...unbearable. My kids won't drink water from the tap anymore, the ICE MAKER has become the "BLEEPING ICE MAKER" because it has jammed twice and I had to chip the stuck ice out with a knife, and now the freezer light is out.

Progress...ain't it great?

Chris

Camp is over...

Alas, it is true; the end of camp has arrived. This is met with a mixture of relief and sadness. The relief comes from the fact that I will now always know--at least for the rest of the summer--where my kids are and what they are doing. The sadness comes from knowing that I will be stuck watching them every minute of every day from now until school starts.

Usually, camp ends and there are two weeks until school starts. I have filled these weeks in the past with school shopping, dentist appointments, hair cuts and searching for the paperwork I forgot to turn in at the end of school last year. You know the stuff the school absolutely-must-have-or-your-kid-can't-come papers?

This summer, however, has four weeks left until school starts. Some politician somewhere thought that it would be great if the kids didn't have to go back until after Labor Day. (He--and you know it is a he--wished to remain anonymous so that the roving mob of mothers looking for him don't find him.)

So now I have to fill two weeks. I have to find fun and informative and educational things to do to entertain and prepare my children for school. The zoo in 97 degree heat is one of my favorites. Sitting in beach traffic is another one of the highlights I have planned. Then there is the ever famous stand-in-line-and-get-heat-stroke-at-the-water-park day.

Maybe if I'm feeling really adventurous, we'll put everyone in the car and drive the 8 hours to visit my in-laws in sunny Hazleton, PA.

All I know, is that whatever I do, wherever we go, I will be looking for that one sign that says in no uncertain terms that school is just around the corner. What is that sign, you ask?

It is the Staples commercial. C'mon, you know the one. It's the one with all the pouty faced kids standing in the store as the joyful parents glide up and down the aisle throwing school supplies into the carriage while in the background you hear..."It's the most wonderful time of the year..."

It's Christmas in August...

Chris

The Neighbor Kids...

The neighborhood is going to hell in a hand-basket.

I haven't always liked my neighborhood. It's kind of snotty on occasion. Sometimes, it is like being in high-school. Everyone has something to say about everyone.

Over time, we worked it all out. We are civil to everyone and have  few good friends. The kids all gather here or next door. It's been good.

Until--the new neighbors moved in.

I am always excited when we get new neighbors. There is some foolish part of me that thinks new neighbors will take a good situation and make it better. Well, not this time.

The people across the street have four kids--two older boys and a boy in first grade and a five year old girl. The younger kids mesh nice with mine--or they would if they weren't raised by their parents.

Since they have moved in, my children have learned all kinds of new words. The best was when my five year old daughter asked at the dinner table, "Why do they call a boy's private parts a dick?"

My husband will not recover. For him, some part of her innocence died that day. He will never be the same.

Now, I have to go over there and knock on the door and explain to that mother that my five year old just walked through the door and asked me what a nigger is.

I have been trying to calm down. I have been trying to gather my thoughts. It is not working.

I am going now and Lisa is going to take up a collection for my bail.

Chris

My Days..These Days

  My days, these days, are directed by this 4 month old Labrador puppy.  Starting at 6 a.m.  Yes, that is when this primadonna stands over me in the bed and wakes me up to begin our day.  Oh, yeah, but only after she gets my husband up at 3 a.m. to go out, afterwards returning to our bedroom and bugging me until I pick her up and put her in the bed with us.  She has, however, learned that if she wants to stay in the bed, she must sleep at the foot of the bed.

OK, on with the day.  We (meaning me and the 4 dogs), trample downstairs and I proceed to dole out dog treats.  The yorkie gets 2 and the retrievers each get 4.  This is based on the fact that the retrievers can eat 4 in the time the yorkie can eat 2 so it all comes out in the wash. 

After all of that, the morning routine begins.  This is not a pleasant routine mind you.  While I'm trying to enjoy my coffee and updating the blog, I am constantly having to get up and let the dogs in...let the dogs out....let the dogs in....let the dogs out.  All of this is due to Kelli's psycho morning behavior of running through the house and picking play fights with the other dogs.  By 8:30 a.m. she has collapsed and I manage to be able to go to the gym to swim for an hour. 

Between the time I get home and about 1:00 p.m. she is pretty self sufficient.  Meaning that she mosies around the house and naps here and there.  At 1:00 sharp, she is by my side with her paw on my leg.  It is serious nap time.  No, I'm not kidding.  We go upstairs and I have to put her on the bed and we take a nap.  Usually I read but if I do happen to fall asleep, she is there to wake me at precisly 3:00 p.m. in the same manner she wakes me in the morning, standing over top of me.  I'm really not making this up.  Ask Chris, I disappear from the blog world between 1 and 3.

Between 3 and 5 p.m. we are back to the routine of letting the dogs in....letting the dogs out...letting the dogs in...letting the dogs out.  Again, due to Kelli's psycho behavior.  Precisly at 5:00 p.m. she is sitting at the garage door waiting for dinner.  After dinner, more phycho running around.  At this time in the evening, she chooses to stay outside to play and run the fence with the neighbor's dog. 

At 8 p.m. she is on th sofa to watch the O'Reilly Factor.  Yes she watches O"Reilly with me.  (she also likes to watch the Colonel on Sunday mornings but, shh, don't tell him). She continues to nap until exactly 10 p.m.  That is when she is back by my side, with her paw on my leg, barking at me to tell me it's time to go to bed.  It's even gotten so bad that if I don't have the light out by 11, she is giving me the eye.

Then we start all over.

Now, I know what you're thinking..and don't say it.  My mother says it all the time.  I'm nuts.  Well maybe I am.  But I gotta tell ya', I didn't have my kids on a schedule this good when they were little.  But then I don't have Kelli on a schedule...she has me on one. 

Hmmm....

Lisa

Yes It's True...Your Kids Lie

All kids lie.  If you don't believe that, then you're an idiot and your head is buried so far in the sand that your brain is oxygen deprived.  Hey, I'm the first to admit my girls lied when they were growing up.  My son is still a work in progress but he is certainly carrying on his sisters' traditions with just as much flair. 

Oh yeah, I know, your precious little darlings would never lie to you because you are raising them with an "open line of communication."  Oh, and they tell you about EVERYTHING they are doing and EVERYONE they hang out with.  HAHAHAHAHA.. you are so gullible.  Look, the fact is that for every one thing your kids tell you that they are doing, there are ten things they're not telling you about.  So why not have some fun with it.  Catch'em.

My absolute favorite "gotcha" story is about our oldest.  She was 13 and had been invited to spend the night with a friend.  They were going to the movies to see "Meet Joe Black" which was rated PG-13.  At least that was the story.  So the weekend goes by without a hitch.  On Tuesday, my husband is checking the pockets of my daughter's jeans when he comes across a movie ticket stub.  And guess what.... it ain't for Meet Joe Black.  Yup, it's for an R rated movie of which I cannot remember the name.  But that's irrelevant.  The rule in our house was no R-rated movies.  Period. 

Oh, baby, this was gonna' be fun.  I was so excited, I was giddy.  That night, after all of the softball practice, cheerleading practice and soccer practice, we sat down at the table to eat dinner.  About half way through the meal, my husband asked my daughter how the movie was Saturday night.  OK, now this girl is good....but not that good.  She starts reeling off the trailer of Meet Joe Black.  So I say, "Yes, we know all of that, but why did Brad Pitt's character hang around with Anthony Hopkins's character."  She stuttered a bit and then my husband goes in for the kill.  "Well maybe you can't answer because you didn't see Meet Joe Black..you saw (and he said the name of the R movie) instead." And he pulled out the movie ticket stub.

Ha....GOTCHA'.  You could have bought her for a nickel.  She was speechless for about 30 seconds.  Then she put down her fork, looked at both of us and said, "I'll be in my room.  Just let me know how long I'm grounded.  I'd like to go ahead and get it over with." 

She was grounded for a week.

AAAHHHH....Victory is sweet.

Lisa

Can Girls Marry Girls?

My daughter asked me a question today. Honest to God, that is not an abnormal thing. She asks me questions from the moment she wakes up--“Mom, can I have a popsicle?” until she falls asleep—“Mom, can I have a popsicle tomorrow?"

But today’s question was a little different.

“Mom, boys are stupid. Can girls marry girls instead?"

If it seems bizarre for a five year old to be asking about marriage keep in mind that my sister is getting married and there has been a lot of talk about marriage and weddings lately. There has been a lot of talk about how it would have been nice if my sister had eloped too, but that stuff you can find on the Wedding from Hell page.

So, there it was hanging out there--can girls marry girls.

Here is where it would be dangerous to over think the issue. I mean she’s five. The answer is no; girls can’t marry girls--nowhere but in Massachusetts. So, “No” would be the answer, right?

No was the answer I gave.

“Why?” was the question I got.

Um…want a popsicle?

Again this would be a bad point to over think things.

I mean at some point I’m going to have to explain homosexuality to my kids and I know that, but when Kaileigh asked me how you make a baby and I told her women had eggs she got confused. Sometimes she walks around with her hands over where I showed her her ovaries are saying, “I can’t feel any eggs."

Since she’s five and confused about her own parts I didn’t really think today was the day to get into whose parts go where in other circumstances. So…I said, “Because the law doesn’t allow it."

She seemed Ok with that. I gave her a popsicle and off she went. Half a second later she returned and asked me a question.

“Can women be in the army?"

This one is simple. I love this question.

"Yup."

"Can they do everything boys can do in the army?"

"Nope. They can’t be in combat roles. They can fix trucks, fly planes and stuff like that, but they don’t really get to kill the bad guys."

"That’s not fair."

“Nope. And sometimes life isn’t fair."

Chris