What kids are Thankful for...

On Thanksgiving I asked my kids what they were thankful for -in this order:

My son said:
House

Sister

Grandma

Grandpa

Daddy

Mama

(interesting that I came last on his list)

My daughter's list:

Grandpa

Grandma

Salsa

Eggs

Pinecones

sandwiches

Necklace

paper

pen

Mommy

Daddy

First Girlfriend...

The other night out of the blue my son was climbing into bed and rather sheepishly, yet matter-of-factly said,

"Mom I want to get a girlfriend."

That was about the last thing I expected him to say.

"You do?"

"Yeah, I'm going to get a Transformer that changes into a car, and buy a girlfriend."

--Curse that movie! He didn't see it on my watch!
"Do you know what a girlfriend is?"
Blushing a bit and pulling the covers partly over his head, he spoke through a shy grin, "Yes, it's a girl...that's cute."
"Is there a girl you think is cute?"
"Yes."
"Who?"
"Sara"

"Oh.. you're right, she is cute, isn't she."

Update:

More details came out in a bedtime story. The story as revealed to Grandma had a part where he kissed a certain "P..." on the lips. As suspected, I think the girlfriend is a preschool love.

Love letters

I have had so much fun being scribe for my kids as letters to my brothers are dictated weekly. I just thought I would share one:

"I love you! You need to come to us and to be grateful. and don't forget your jammies and your marching clothes. You are the best uncle and you are my best uncle and I am 4. The firetruck and the fireman. I saw a picture with leaves on it...I spy with my little eye, something that's brown and you guess it. It's leaves and red and orange! Won't you guess it please? The whole world is what?? and I saw something funny, when I opened the window. I sneaked in my room and if someone came in my room I scared them and they screamed to death again and again. We played a game and earthly home. I am going to sing a song, 'I am a child of God and he sent me here an earthly home and parents and kindly truly thing, teach me kindly, walk beside me, won't you please come here?'??????(he had fun typing all of the question marks)" I have an idea to you. If you sneak into your thing to you, you sneak in someone's drawer and then open it and then come out and scare them, an earthly home and you are a question????? And we have, that's a wonderful question. An earthly home has a deal and treat them well, AMEN.
Now my sister wants a turn:"Sssssssssssssssggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggdddddddddddddddddddd
xxxxxxxxxxxzzzzzzzzzzzzbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb
bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb
bbbbnnnnnnnnnnnnnnvvvvvvvcccccccccccxxxxxxffffffffrrrrreeeeeeerrrrrrtttttttttt

(In case you couldn't tell, my little Miss "Ebbe do it myself" typed her own.)

Taco Flavored Ground Turkey $1 per pound who can resist?

In my attempt to cut calories and costs, I bought a taco flavored ground turkey roll (you know the kind in plastic with metal wire twisted over the ends)
My son walked in just as I was squeezing the contents into the frying pan.
“Mom, what are you doing?”
“Making dinner”
Then slightly concerned, but very trustingly he asked, “Is that Poop?”
His question made me take a second look, and I nearly lost my appetite. I assured him it would taste better than it looked. But, when it came time to eat, the little guy opted for a tuna sandwich. Do you blame him?

It's official!

Well, I am happy to announce that we are officially (knock on wood) done potty training! We have had at least a week without an accident (when awake) and have successfully used public restrooms! (I did have to get a bit creative to keep those really loud flushing automatic toilets from flushing with a tiny hiney hanging over.) Luckily only that one tramatic glove experience. Now hopefully we can avoid regression. I have already found somewhere better to spend the $40 a month that we save on diapers too!

Poop Happens--Especially when potty-training!

I have a pre-schooler whose teachers come and do a home visit before classes begin. Our turn was this week. I was babysitting a neighbor up until the visit, and to help keep the house clean took the kids to play in the water. We rushed home to make it in time for the neighbor to get picked up and the teachers' visit. They all came at once, so I put my potty-trainer in my room to watch a movie and hopefully take a nap. She has been potty training for about two weeks now since my niece came to visit and she decided she wanted to be "bid like Dola". She was quiet and I was filling out papers with one teacher while the other was doing some evaluation activities with my son. Then we heard a little crying in my room and struggling to open the door. We figured she had woken up and wondered where we were.

I went to open the door for her, but as I approached, the odor seeping out from under the door told me one little girl had not been asleep. Behind the closed door I found a gloved little girl still in her swimsuit which hung a bit lower in the back now. Her brown mud-like gloves were about 1/4 inch thick,carefully molded around each finger. Little bits of dry fragrant "mud" covered her yellow sponge chair in front of the TV. I quickly made an apology to our guests, turned on the shower and carefully took off the swimsuit to not spill any more of the contents. I plopped it in the toilet, threw her in the shower, swished and flushed a few times, scrubbed a bit, then tried to scrub off the gloves while my daughter screamed "Nooo!!!" in protest. (How thoughtless of me after she worked so hard.) I turned on the fan, scrubbed my hands and then rushed back to finish signing papers. In my hurry I forgot and grabbed the doorknob also caked thickly...AHhh back to the sink, scrub, rag scrub door knob, wash hands, run to grab disinfectant spray, spray knob and anything else in reach and run back to finish signing papers--but where's the teacher's pen?..."Don't worry, she assures me, "I'm sure I put it in my bag." (What she really was saying was, "Honey I don't want it back") Pretty soon a soggy cleaner smelling girl appeared in her "puppy towel" and we said goodbye to the teachers. I went back to the scene of the accident, removed the chair cover, washed it, the sides of the coffee table, a DVD case, and anything else I could find that looked dirty, vacuumed, and went to make lunch. Yummy!

Later that day during their afternoon swim in my bath tub big brother informed me that she "pooped in the tub". I am not exactly sure what happened, because all I could see was a nicely formed wet nugget on the step in front of the tub--was she trying to get out? Did she just hang her tail overboard, or did someone fish it out? I'm still not sure, just surprised she still had something left inside of her! I have heard of similar stories, but I just didn't expect it to happen to me--luckily it happened on an otherwise good day!

Kids say the darndest things

I just have to write a few funny things my kids have said as they are starting to use new phrases and terminology. The one that sparked this entry was just after I had had the talk with my 4 year old, the one that I wish I didn't have to have until he was 10 or more, but alas, this is the world we live in... anyway, I was walking by and heard him from the bathtub say, "Don't!... that's my favorite part!" spoken like a true man. On the subject of bathtubs (or our indoor pool as we like to call it) my son asked me to get him some "gobbles" for his bath. When I asked him what he needed them for he said so that he could see under the water while he swims.
We were riding a public bus last week and he turned around and noticed the man sitting behind us covered in tatoos. "Mommy, what did he do?" he asked rather loudly. The man sort of chuckled as I searched for something to say. Then embarrassed he said to me, "Mommy he heard me!" which seemed to shock him almost as much.
After a little roadrash from sliding on the loose gravel on the road in front of our house, my kids and I decided it was time to sweep it up. I filled the dust pan and my daughter emptied it into a bucket, my son found a stick that was frayed and worked hard scraping away at the pavement. At one point he stopped and said, "We are working really hard." I agreed. Then he continued, "We are learning lots of money!" I was hoping to teach other things, but we'll work with what we get!