Drains, Push-Ups, and Harry Potter

A few days ago I noticed the drain in our kitchen sink acting up.  I chastised it by running the garbage disposal repeatedly, but with great gentleness, as the garbage disposal frightens me.  If whirling blades hidden in a dark, dirty cave that are somehow hooked up to both water and electricity don't scare you, well, I tip my hat to you.  You are made of sterner stuff than I.  Also, on a completely unrelated note, kindly make an appointment with your friendly neighborhood head shrinker at your earliest convenience.

Shockingly, running the disposal did not fix the problem, even when intermingled with prayer in varying doses, to the extent that by this morning there was standing water in the tub of the dishwasher and the sink drains were crankier than ever.

I had a counter-full of dirty dishes, but thankfully I also had three children sitting around, handily home for summer break.

I put on my Supervisor hat and loaded each kid down with two arms-worth of dishes and sent them upstairs to the bathroom.  (I had carefully scraped every last crumb of food into the trash, for any of you who are miraculously 1. still reading this, and 2. worried for the future of my bathroom drains.)

I used a bucket of soapy water to wash the dishes, the bathtub faucet to rinse, and my three favorite indentured servants to dry, cart downstairs, and put away, rotating assembly-line style.

Maybe halfway through, when my back started screaming at me from all the hunching over and twisting and I was unpleasantly reminded of pregnancy, as I am anytime my back throws a toddler-worthy tantrum, Caedmon chimed in, "Isn't this fun?"  The other two agreed:  "It's like an adventure!"  "I've never washed dishes upstairs before!"  I zipped my lips before any negative sentiments could fall out, skip gaily over to our children, and suction themselves to those sweet, naive, sheltered bodies.

By the time we were done, big crock pot put away and everything, the exotic chore had lost a bit of its luster even for the kids, although Adelaide remarked, "This all gives me a lot of sympathy for people who lived a long time ago.  We just did some dishes and it was so much work."  I agreed and then we all decided a break had been earned, being 21st century sloths, ourselves.

I, at least, have a semi-valid excuse for any slow movement today, as I had a severe asthma/allergy attack last night after supper.  It was very strange to experience one during daylight hours, as they usually strike in the middle of the night.  The perk to this was that two texts to Derek from the bathroom and he was rabbiting out of the house for liquid Benadryl, which is the fastest acting allergy med according to my doc, and a drug I should ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS have on hand, also according to my doc.  Ha, ha, whoops, sorry, Dr. T!  *laughs, gasps, wheezes, passes out because I can't manage to follow doctor's orders.*

The dross lining is that I scared the kids, to the extent that both the boys clutched me, crying, when it was clear I wasn't actually going to die.  I'm not sure what triggered the attack- the only two novel foods at supper were a barbecue sauce and the blackberry cobbler.  I had taste-tested the sauce at the grocery store, though, and I've had all the ingredients in the cobbler before, if not combined in that precise way.  Well, this was my first time with frozen blackberries as opposed to fresh, I guess.  Either way, boo.

Oh, but good stuff has been happening, too, because despite what I may have led you to believe over the course of this post, our lives are not a Greek tragedy.  Although if it were, our children would make a darling chorus.

Derek has been doing push-ups with a living, breathing, wriggling fifty-pound weight on his back.  This causes delight on the part of the weight, exhaustion on that of the pusher-upper.

Adelaide has been doing exactly what you're supposed to do when it's summer, which is read in a hammock.

But it's a falling-apart hammock, so she also earns the label "daredevil" with this practice.

Really, I think it's just a desperate desire to be away from her loud brothers for five seconds, especially whilst re-reading the Harry Potter series.  She's still impressed by my ability to finish most of the sentences she begins reading aloud from the HP books- tell me, when will she stop thinking the things I can do are fun or cool?  It feels inevitable, but I can't predict its arrival.  She is an accomplished eye-roller, if that helps.

Speaking of Harry Potter (I feel like I say that a lot), I just love Harry Potter jokes.

The end.

Unexpected Snow Day Adventures

7-8 inches of new snow + high winds + dropping temps = going on our second snow day in a row.  It's served as a nice little break from our regularly scheduled life, but sometimes our children need to be reminded that they are not allowed to go all flying squirrel in the house.  Outside?  Sure.  Whatever.

They've spent large portions of both days outside, and while I sometimes feel a pang that I am not that mom that spends hours outside making snowlumps and snow forts with them, I get over it real quick and get back to my usual routine of setting the trash/ compost bowl/ whatever right outside the door and hollering, "Somebody come take care of this, please!" in their general direction.  Then I hurriedly shrink back in because it is warm in here and cold out there, and that's pretty much all my brain needs to know to make its decision.

Sometimes I stay at the door long enough to take a picture through the glass.  That's just good parenting.

I assuage any residual guilt with the knowledge that I spent an hour shoveling this morning, then I make hot chocolate for everyone and give myself a sanctimonious little pat on the back.

Today I'm doing an experiment in cookie dough, because Adelaide was making peanut butter cookies yesterday afternoon, but within about a minute of turning on the oven, I smelled a very strong scent of gas, so I turned the oven off and called Derek.  He said to get the heck out of the house and call the energy company, who would send a tech out to inspect everything.  So I called the energy company, and they said to get the heck out of the house, they would send a tech out to inspect everything.  The guy on the phone also said exciting things like, "Do not turn any lights on or off.  Do not open any windows.  If you are on a landline, do not hang up the phone, leave it off its cradle.  We do not want to risk creating any sparks.  Get out now."

I instructed Adelaide to get bundled up as best she could with the winter gear right by the front door, then I went upstairs to rouse both the boys from their naps (see flying squirrel reference above; they had worn themselves out by midafternoon) and hurried them down the stairs.

A few delightful pieces of information:  If Atticus is in the house, he is wearing shorts.  We keep our house at 67 degrees in the winter during the day, and 60 starting at 8:30 every evening, but he still wears shorts.  Yesterday, while Adelaide was making the cookie dough, I was doing laundry, specifically boy laundry, which includes every pair of pants Atticus owns and his snow pants because I like his teacher and don't want her to faint from the scent coming off of them every day at school.  Because of all this, when we got out of the house, Atticus was wearing snow pants that hit about mid-shin over his shorts, along with snow boots and two jackets, because oh, yeah, I was washing all their coats, too.  Ditto the multiple, layered jacket look on Caedmon.  We looked homeless, but I figured it was no big deal, we were just going to go hang out at our small town library for a while 'til either the technician figured out the source of the problem or our house exploded in a giant fireball.

We arrived at the library.  There was a hand-lettered sign informing us it had closed early, I'm guessing due to the weather.  Super.

So we went to Wal-Mart, because at least there we'd fit in, right?  I've heard about that People of Wal-Mart website, and while I doubt it applies to everyone on there, keep in mind that some of those customers may look like that because they've been turned out of their house and had to dress in whatever was immediately by the front door.  It's possible.

So we went to Wal-Mart, got the kids' valentines for school, got a call telling us to come back, there would be no slow suffocation tonight.  All the hallelujahs.

The technician was really nice, but informed me that yes, something is up with our oven, and that we are not allowed to turn it on until we get it looked at.  As of today, we have an appliance repair guy coming out in a week to look at it, because that's the soonest he can get here.  Hence the cookie dough in a crock pot.  I mean, I couldn't let Adelaide's beautiful dough go to waste, could I?

I'm not real sure how it's going to turn out; we could be treating ourselves to peanut butter mush tonight.  Or it could be our new favorite dessert!  Aren't adventures fun?

The Sights

Sights that fill my heart with joy:

Our children doing chores.  [Insert evil but sincere laugh here.]

Because each of our children are unique, individual human beings, they're each good at different things- including chores.  Caedmon is my go-to mopper, as he's thorough and careful to scrub when needed, something that his two older siblings can't (WON'T) seem to grasp.

Plus his dimple comes out when he's putting some muscle into the job.  If that isn't added incentive to give him this particular task, I don't know what is.

Atticus, on the other hand, is the kid I call upon when I have a mountain of towels to fold.  It's not his favorite chore, but I tell him that not everyone can be a master of the tri-fold.  He is very comforted by this.
He's also my head snow shoveler.

I took this picture on Christmas Eve, after we'd been to church and he'd had to sit still and listen to adults for close to an hour.  As soon as we got home, he begged to go out and shovel, as he had energy to burn.  This had the added benefit of making me look like a monster to our neighbors, sending our seven-year-old boy out into the cold to do manual labor on the night before Christmas, all while I watched in my fancy holiday clothes from within the comfortable warmth of our house.  I thought about making a big sign to hold up to the window: "HE ASKED FOR IT," but I decided there was a faint possibility that could be misconstrued.

::Right here you'll have to fill in your own image of Adelaide taking out the trash or unloading the dishwasher, as she seems to find it insulting when I take pictures of her doing chores while I sip my iced tea and nibble delicately on lemon cookies as I recline in my easy chair.::

Only kidding.  I don't much care for iced tea.

Other sights I always enjoy:

Is this or is this not the most perfect coffee receptacle you've ever seen?  It's from The Awkward Yeti, and let me tell you, if you've ever felt like the only thing missing in your life is a hilarious comic featuring cartoon internal organs, then get ready to achieve nirvana.  I follow him on Instagram, because I am not a fool and I never underestimate the effect of a well-executed gall bladder joke.

And finally, despite all my attempts at visualizing a vomit-free weekend, last night was... well, let's just say it was decidedly malodorous.  As of now, this illness has felled 60% of the residents of this household, and although I'm hoping Derek and I will emerge unscathed, given the amount of times my person has waded through a quagmire of germ juice over the past few days, it's not looking good.  So far, though, it only seems to be a 24-hour bug, where it hits its victims with uncalled-for violence, but then more or less leaves them alone to sleep it off and emerge more or less back to normal.  

This morning Adelaide and Caedmon were making up for hours of action last night.

These still count as joyful sights to behold, as the visage of our sleeping children makes my twisted little heart glow on any day, but when they've been sick?  Those sleeping babes make me whisper-yell, "HALLELUJER!" (so as not to wake them, see), because that means it's finally break time, and by "break time" I mean time to wash every piece of bedding or clothing  you can sneak out of their rooms without waking them, lighting candles in every room, and opening any and all bedroom windows, because the outside temp may be below freezing, but at this point, fresh is fresh air, man.

Please note that she surrounded herself with all the things that comfort her:  A bag full of library books, a coloring book and pens, and there under her head you can just make out the little pink pillow I made for her to take to kindergarten.

So!  What sights fill your heart with joy these days?  Do, do share, as I could use a few extra merry sights during this bleak, colorless time of year.

Ideal Idyll

This summer.  Man.  While it hasn't been terrible, it has been chock-full of unexpected events and happenings.  For someone like me, who appreciates spontaneity provided there's been ample warning given, this has been a little stressful.

This week, however, all the members of our family are back at home, where we belong, where we should stay, forever and ever, amen.

With that in mind, you will understand why low-key summers are my love language.  Definition of low-key:


Having your dad assist you in your dreams toward superhero-dom:

Neither Adelaide nor Atticus could execute that Superman pose; both are way too gangly and leggy anymore.  My mom recently commented on the excess of limbs they're both sporting these days; I told her it was like living with spiders.  Caedmon's still compact enough- not to mention strangely strong- to make this look easy.

Bubbles are the definition of low-key.

How to know you've kept your kids' entertainment expectations nice and low, where they belong:  They lose their minds when you bust out surprise packs of cheap bubbles.  You'd think I'd announced we were going to Disneyland.

Bubbles:  The most exciting thing to happen to him all day.

Really, this is almost sad.

We've also been doing things like playing in the rain and playing with Legos and running and reading, not to mention my continued quest toward the title of Heartless Dictator (actual words spoken by one of our children) in the form of daily chore lists.  Atticus likes to get his list first thing every day, so he can get it done right away and have the rest of the day to spend as he pleases.  Adelaide does hers relatively quickly (with some choice muttering here and there, depending on the chore); Caedmon whines and procrastinates and plays the devastated victim until it becomes clear I'm about to lose it.

Ah, summer.

Their New Favorite Chore

I've been trying to see things from my neighbor's perspective lately.  Put myself in his shoes, so to speak.

I'm talking about that one neighbor that somehow always happens to be walking his dog in front of our house at the most inconvenient times.  Like when I'm waging battle against a thorny rosebush, or throwing a tantrum in the middle of shoveling snow.

Last week as he approached our house, he couldn't have failed to notice the two small children struggling to make their way across our front yard.  The boy had an easy enough time of it, holding two small trash bags, but the girl- she was half-carrying, half-dragging a trash sack as big as she was.  I'm sure he also witnessed the mom opening the window and yelling, "You can't drag it like that- you'll break open the bag!  Pick it up!  OH PLEASE.  It's not THAT heavy, Adelaide!"

Once the two kids made it to the trash bin that sits on the edge of our yard, I hope he noticed that those two kids were getting a valuable lesson in teamwork- the girl reached up to flip open the lid for her shorter brother, who threw the bags up in the air and inside the bin.  The two children then heaved and pushed, wrestling the larger, unwieldy and smelly bag up, over their heads, and after what looked like some major effort on both their parts, managed to tip it into the plastic bin.  Mission accomplished.

And perhaps he was more interested in our mums than in the sight that greeted those two children when their mother opened the front door.  "Good job, guys!  Now go take these boxes out.  Don't worry, I already flattened them for you.  Oh, Adelaide, stop.  It's not that cold out- just wait 'til I make you do this in the middle of winter!  Now that will be miserable!"


No wonder he never wants to talk to me.