Death by Stairs

My posts over the next month are going to be fairly limited as I tend to spend a lot of time making homemade Christmas gifts this time of year. Plus, I have a day job that isn't parenting that I do while I'm parenting. So, enjoy this one while you can! I plan to pick this thing up again when I finish up all my work and Christmas stuff!

My laundry room is down in my basement. The majority of my kids' toys are in the basement as well. So, every time I bring laundry downstairs, there's a significant risk of death or paralysis.


Also, note that my cat is darting under my feet at that exact moment, as well. He's cool like that. And, by cool, I mean heinous.

So . . . if nobody can find me, I could be lying on the basement floor amidst toys and laundry. Note that, please. Thanks.

Total. System. Reboot.

As much as I complain about the nuttiness of this household, nothing could've prepared me for the love overload that happens whenever I see this:


There is pretty much nothing in life that compares.

And, that's the face I make when it happens. Total. System. Reboot.

The Baby-Proofing is Not Enough

In case you're lacking in climbing, crazy, little boys in your household, let me just give you a little peek.



Yep. This stuff happens. A lot. In fact, if you have this going on, you actually get to a point where you say a little prayer of "thanks" to God when kids like this make it to their next birthday.

Bank Trip

I had to go into the bank one day because they had, like, two tellers in the whole place running both the drive-through and the counter. I originally started in the drive-through, but I had to leave (after I sent my money through the vortex-teleportation device, of course). I was going to be late to pick up Nora (I seriously sat there in my car by the vortex-teleportation device for 20 minutes after being greeted once).

Never would I attempt to go into a bank with what I've got going on these days, but I did this, very nearly, to prove a point. What was my point? You do not want me to come inside your bank, so you'd better tell me that my money is okay, like, pronto.

I'm hoping they learned their lesson. This was not a surprise scene for me, but that doesn't make it any less annoying.

That's the Way the Cookie Crumbles

Remember that science lesson in elementary/middle school where we learn about the difference between physical and chemical changes? It's really hard to teach that lesson to a quirky two-year-old.

When my kids finish their lunch or dinner, they are allowed to have a cookie. Most days, it's just an Oreo, but sometimes, they score it big and get a chocolate chip cookie (if my husband or I had the motivation to bake some).

My eldest son is typically very excited about getting a chocolate chip cookie. In fact, he'll sit there for about two whole minutes with a giant, surprised expression on his face, much like this:



Then, after much verbal motivation from me, he finally starts to eat the cookie. He very quickly discovers that the cookie is soft (how I like 'em), and the cookie falls apart. This usually involves him yelling, "OH, NO!" followed by something that looks like this:

Yep, those are some rage tears.

I try to explain to him over and over that the cookie is still a cookie and still very much delicious, but he refuses to believe it. Usually, it takes his sister asking, "Mommy, if he isn't going to eat his cookie, can I eat it?" before he wises up and eats the cookie pieces. Goofball.

Tap Tap Taparoo

Every weekday morning, it's always the same thing. I try, frantically, to get the kids something to eat. I try to make sure the baby is okay so that I can get something to eat (and try to get coffee into my system as fast as possible). Then, I might even try to clean up part of the house or throw in a load of laundry, if I think it's possible.

As you may well know by now, I find my dog to be largely annoying. He eats half of just about everything I bake. He eats napkins. He waits until we're not paying attention, and he gets into our bed and sheds everywhere and leaves "questionable prints" on our pillows and sheets (typically after I've just washed and changed the bedding).

There is one thing that he does every single day that makes me want to punt him. He tap dances around me until I go downstairs (in the basement) and feed him. It looks a lot like the following:



Imagine a ridiculous and constant tapping sound as his paws contact the floor.

These are his tap dancing moves. Up and down and up and down and tappy tappy tap tap tap. Tap tap taparoo!



This is me, every weekday morning, at my wit's end with the dog. I'm pretty sure I can be heard saying things like, "Knock it off, dog!" or, "Calm down, ding-dong!"

I'm not typically a morning person, but I'm not an un-morning person, if you know what I mean. The dog pretty much obliterates the easygoing nature from my soul every weekday morning when he's tap-tap-tapping around me while I'm trying to, like, feed my children and be a functional human being.

I recognize that he thinks he's absolutely going to die of starvation every morning, but I'd honestly rather he just stand there and bark at me over the tap dancing. He knocks stuff over. He runs into the kids. He sends my area rugs across the room because he tap dances across them. He pretty much delays getting fed because I'm too busy trying to undo his path of destruction as I'm trying to get to the task of feeding him.

Destroyer of Conversation

Our eldest son has a magical way of figuring out the exact moment that my husband or I will speak (to one another), and he emits some sort of voice-cancelling squawk. Every time.



We really have no idea how he does it. He's strangely proficient at it.

Most of our conversations have to happen when he is sleeping, which is pretty much never.

Sleep-Deprivation Correction

It must be sleep-deprivation (and also, it is symbolic of the life that this poor baby leads), but I completely forgot that I was holding the baby in this scenario from my previous blog post:



So, when you look at that one, imagine my pointing arm being also full of a very heavy baby. That also helps to explain why I'm not detangling my other son with that "free hand" or drinking that Coke that with that other "free hand."

Yeah. Wow.

Oh, Forget About It!

Making appointments or simple phone calls is pretty much impossible these days.

I don't know what it is about me being on the phone that makes my kids freak out and need me right then. I try and sneak away from them to make a call (you know, if they're, like, engrossed in a snack or Mickey Mouse Clubhouse or something), and without fail, they always find me and choose that moment to want to play, to complain about their attire, or to projectile vomit. It's uncanny.


I especially can't just answer the phone and expect to have a normal conversation without experiencing something similar to these scenes.

Also, for some reason, any time the phone rings, I'm elbows deep in a dirty diaper either here:


Or, here:


(I'm spraying out a dirty diaper in the toilet, here, in case you're curious.)

So, if you're wondering why I never seem to call (or answer the phone), wonder no more. And, you're welcome.

Pet Rage Post

I really hadn't intended to whine about my pets in two, consecutive blog posts, but I have to. I'm so incredibly enraged by my dog right now, that I absolutely have to blow off some steam with a rage blog post so that I don't lie in bed and fume about him all night long. I tried walking several blocks right after this particular incident (of which the description is forthcoming, by the way) initially to try and cool down, but I'm still coming down off it.

Side note: this is probably too much information, but once I returned from my rage walk, I nursed my baby and made some comment like, "Gee. I hope rage doesn't transfer through breast milk."

I don't think it did.

Without further ado, here are three, recent offenses that have honked me off royally with this dog. (And, I have a daily offense that he does that I intend to blog about at a later date, but this will have to do for now.)

































Any time I forget to wipe off the table after the kids eat, or if, gasp, the cat decides to hurl on the dining room table (that honks me off, too, by the way), I get to discover this, little gem. One day, I have grand designs of refinishing (buffing) that table when my kids get older and when that dog/cat combo croaks on us one day.

Ah, yes. Who could forget the infamous birthday cake scarfage? Yep. The dog freaking ate half of my kid's birthday cake whilst it was cooling. I about flipped a biscuit that day, too.

You know what he did tonight, though? I baked six awesome, round loaves (for bread bowls for a broccoli cheddar soup I made over the weekend), and I had three of them left. Do you see where this is going?

That punk freaking lifted off that covering and scarfed ALL THREE LOAVES without leaving a single crumblet behind. I was so furious, I actually had to go for rage walk at 8 p.m. I've never needed a rage walk before, and you know what? It wasn't quite long enough. Thus, the rage blogging.

He has never lifted the cover off of anything and eaten it off the counter, and I am just nuts with fury. I feel like every time I bake, the jackelope has to eat half of it. I can't stand it. He never used to be this crafty . . . or hungry.

He also left some scratches on my new stove that I'm hoping will buff off with time. Nay, he's hoping.

And, do you know what he does every single time he does these things—even if I don't catch him in the act (which, by the way, of these there incidents, I only caught him finishing off the last of the bread)?

This.

Yes. It's huge (the picture) for a reason.

He knows it's wrong. He knows he did something bad. But you know what? The jerk just can't help himself.

WANT TO PUNT!

My Cat is a Jerk

It never fails. Every time I vacuum in my house, my cat feels the need to replace the summation of all the animal hair that I've removed in one fell swoop. It's a regularly scheduled, hot-button issue for me.

"Oh. Here are seven piles of cat hair chunks, a couple of claws (that I tore off myself),
and a couple of whiskers for your trouble. You're welcome."

Little Boys are Gross

Someone needs to tell me what it is that makes little boys do stuff like this:

Yep. That's a chipmunk. And, yes. It is deceased.

Doctor's Office

Ever since I was, like, 12 months pregnant with my youngest, going to the doctor started to get really challenging. In fact, I tried everything at my disposal to try and dump at least one kid off so I could go to my OB appointments close to solo. It didn't always happen.

After my baby was born, something happened. Doctor appointments got worse. My 3.5-year-old (daughter) turned into a two-year-old, and my two-year-old (son) was the dominant influence. I attempted one appointment (for the baby) with the two of them in tow. Never again. Here's a scene from that:

Note how my hair has fly-aways. That's going to be a common theme in this blog. Also, note how my older son is mopping the floor with his body, and my daughter is clearing out the cobwebs behind the examination table with her rear end. They should've probably paid us for the housekeeping. Or not. There's some spilled juice and crackers (crumbled and not) on the floor, so . . . yeah.

This picture doesn't really show how ridiculously loud it was in the room. I'm not really sure how to depict that properly. Just imagine lots of screaming and interruptions every time the doctor tries to talk. Also, imagine me going to my happy place inside my head.

Little Nutter Nuts: An Introduction

My husband and I have three kids. They are gifts from Above. Obviously.

I love them dearly, but often times, I find myself in situations that are a touch unreal. Wait. Maybe unreal isn't the word. Let's just say that prior to having children, imagining (and preparing for) these life scenes would've been improbable. Maybe I'll find the word for it later.

I don't have a lot of spare time, but I'm going to sacrifice a tad bit of sleep and (gasp!) Facebook time to sketch and share with you the chaos (nuttiness) that is my little family. Enjoy.

Oh. We have a dog and cat, too. They'll probably be involved in several sketches as well.