A Staged "Awwww" Moment

Brad barbecued dinner tonight and I took the opportunity to unload the kids on him and get a moment of quiet time encourage the kids to go outside and play in the back yard with Daddy. 

After ten minutes or so of quiet household bliss, I notice that it is strangely silent outside. Silence + outdoors + boy doesn't happen. What the hell? Did they snatch up the flank steak and make a run for it? So I peaked out the back door to find this:

There they were all playing quietly in the sandbox together. All together now: Awwwww.

Of course, by the time I got the camera and opened the door Brad was getting up to go check on the steak. In which I silently flailed around and mouthed at him to get his butt back down there and act just like it was 90 seconds ago. And then Calen stood up and Brad made him get back down like HE had been 90 seconds ago. So this was totally staged. But it was original 90 seconds earlier. 

"I DONE you take a pictures!"

Calen starts school on Tuesday and I really wanted to get some pictures done for preschool, especially a certain pose that I saw on Pinterest that I HAD to copy. Hey, if it's on Pinterest, it's MEANT to be copied, right? As long as I don't claim it as an original idea....which I'm not.

The weather today was perfect and I mean perfect (75, sunny and no humidity) so I decided it was a good time to do his first day of school pictures. Because let's face it. If I waited until the actual first day of school, I'd be scrambling to get the kids ready and fed, Cam would probably poop in three diapers to slow me down, Calen would be bouncing off the walls because he's so excited and I'd be too emotional and jittery to keep my camera in focus. So we do pictures today. I put him in his little first day outfit and brand new shoes and took him out into the back yard. (Yes, I will take a picture or two on his actual first day). 

Calen, for once, was a really good sport. He held still. He smiled. He looked at the camera. It was a God-given miracle and I got all the shots I wanted, and some fun impromptu ones that I wasn't expecting. Like these ones (and yes I know his shorts are too long. They are 5t and WAY longer than I expected. Oh well. Room to grow):

He was doing so awesome that I told him he could have two pieces of candy corn (the new bribery tool in the house). He said he could have five pieces. I said fine. Bartering little turd. But I wasn't done taking pictures, and finally he got tired. But instead of whining like he usually does, he folded his arms, gave me a fake angry face and said:

"I DONE you take a pictures!"

Which actually made me laugh out loud! Especially with the mild speech delay struggles we've had with him. And after such a cute but angry little sentence, how could I force him to continue? (though I did take a picture right at that moment. Because it was just too cute. In an angry sort of way)

So we stopped. And he got his five pieces of candy corn. 

And yes, I did get THE shot I was looking for: (drumroll please)

 I told him to yell "Preschool!" And he did. And it made the perfect.shot.ever. 

Also: When I asked him what he wanted to be when he was big like daddy, he told me: "A Policeman an fireman an drive ambulance an drive hospital motorcycle (because those exist) an drive school bus an be Super Hero Calen an be PIRATE!" After a long conversation we finally narrowed it down to either a policeman or a fireman. 

 

 

 

It's A Tums Kind of Night

Well. You don't get a real blog tonight because I've had an upset stomach all day and am so uninterested in doing anything other than chew on Tums and wear purple and watch my University of Washington Huskies play #3 LSU live. And as they most likely get absolutely annihilated and my stomach gets even more angry (because I'll be angry), I'll eat more Tums. 

Everything is better with Tums. 

And that's that.

Go Dawgs.

And Go Tums.

The Things You Say

We started the morning right by my three year old throwing around some f-bombs before I could even get the milk in his cereal.

"Mommy, I watch fucky?"

"WHAT?!"

"I watch pirate and fucky the boat?"

"You mean Bucky the boat?"

"Yeah. Fucky."

He means Jake and the Neverland Pirates. And the boat's name is Bucky. BUCKY. With a "B".

Later this morning, he proceeded to announce to all the occupants of Kmart that he loved Fucky and that there was a Fucky toy over in the aisle. While I'm whispering loud enough for them to hear "Bucky Calen. BUCKY." 

Then this afternoon he announced to Brad as he was going up the stairs:

"HEY, Daddy come here. I want to talk to you."

'I want to talk to you'? Did he really just say that?

"What is so important, Calen?"

"I watch Pirates and Jake and Fucky today."

In which Brad slowly turns his head wide eyed at me. And instead of giving him an answer, I just shrugged and walked away. Sometime it's more fun to not explain the situation and bake their noodle a little. 

I did explain it to him later during dinner. 

Also, Calen is forbidden to watch Jake and the Neverland Pirates until he can pronounce BUCKY with a very obvious "B" 

....okay, I'm not that mean. But the first call I get from his outraged preschool teacher means another round of speech therapy.  

today at the playground

 

 

A Kangaroo In A Puddle

First of all, Calen had his big boy Preschool Orientation today. We got to check out his school and meet his teachers and fellow little classmates. Luckily I know a handful of of the kids (Coastie brats like Calen) so there were a few slightly familiar faces. Not that it mattered to my social butterfly who will be friends with everyone and anyone. The only thing that Calen disliked about his new school was going home. I think he's going to like it. 

We got home just in time for a torrential rainstorm. I can see that fall and winter are going to be tough seasons for us because Calen kept begging to go outside and swim, play soccer, etc. I told him it was raining. He responded by saying "I go outside and splash in puddles with my boots?!" 

This kid would go outside if a volcano was erupting and molten balls of fire were dropping out of the sky.

Well I guess there's no point of a rain jacket if we don't use it, so I threw it on him (his rain boots are too small at this point) and took him outside, where he gleefully spent the next half hour running and jumping into this large puddle in the parking lot in his bare feet (at one point I convinced him to at least wear sandals).

Well, he IS a Washington boy after all. Rain is a part of daily life. 

Yeah. If you were one of the 192 cars that drove by and slowed down to stare at the crazy person under the umbrella watching her kid run back and forth barefoot in the parking lot, that was me. 

 
He announced to me at one point as he was jumping over and over "I'm a kangaroo in a puddle!" and by the time we brought him inside he was soaked head to toe, but he got his outdoor time and I got some pretty cute pictures. 

Wordless Wednesday (with words)

Daddy was fixing using doing something with the vacuum cleaner. He turned it on just for a second to test it or use it or something. This got Camden's attention so he marched over to the vacuum, stuck his head in it, and yelled:

"BAAAAHHHHH!!!!" 

Just to make sure he was not out-yelled by a vacuum cleaner.

He then continued to crouch down and help daddy fix use do something with the vacuum. And he and Daddy had *almost* matching Seahawks jerseys too which made it extra cute. 

Hey vacuum, NO ONE is allowed to be louder than ME.

Entering Present Day

Brad and I finally decided to take the plunge and entered the 21st century:

Welcome, 150 channels and NFL Sunday Ticket! It's nice to meet you.

Yep, after almost two years of not having cable tv, we finally said "this is outrageous" and got Directv. With DVR. And NFL Sunday Ticket. And HD. And All that fun stuff. 

Yes, we have gone THAT long without cable/satellite tv (even though we are tech junkies). No, this isn't the first time we've ever had cable. We had it when we first moved here. But were attempting to be cheap cut costs by canceling it and keeping only Netflix. 

And we decided hell, if we're going to get Directv, we might as well pay a little more and get every NFL game ever each week! But when ordering Directv, they decided that we got NFL Sunday Ticket for free. Well, if you insist!

We decided Directv over our usual Comcast because Comcast is BRAIN DAMAGED and doesn't have a deal with the NFL to broadcast all the out of market games. Because they're stupid. And not very smart. And stupid. 

The Mass Exodus

Today is the best day of the whole year for Cape May.

The day when ALL the tourists leave Cape May in a mass exodus. No obnoxious tourists until Memorial Day next year! Holla! 

My neighbor friend Marina and I decided to celebrate the extra day off by leaving all five of our combined kids with the dads while we went up north to go to Toys R Us...without the kids. Our actual reason was to find some outdoor activities for the kids to do this fall - soccer nets, t-ball stands, etc. But we used it as an excuse to spend a kid free afternoon in the toy store, where we could get ideas for Christmas and browse around freely without hearing "Mommy look! Mommy I NEED this car Mommy Mommy Mommy"....

One thing I forgot about the mass exodus out of Cape May is that it is a MASS EXODUS...which means traffic.was.terrible. We had planned on going to Vineland but the two lane highway was stopped up for miles and miles and miles, to the point where I finally said eff it, turned around and risked going up the Parkway to Mays Landing (the other shopping center), assuming that the three lane freeway would be much better. 

It wasn't.

All in all it took us two and a half hours to get to Mays Landing. But that was okay with us because we didn't have whining impatient children with full bladders in the back seat. And we got to screw around in Toys R Us kid free for a couple hours too.

And it only took us half an hour to get home. 

"Delays AHEAD." There's no "ahead" about it. We've been stopped for an hour.

 

 

Lollipops

It was a "blah" day for me. As in I felt very "blah" and wasn't interested in anything that involved getting off the couch. But, while Calen kept himself busy coloring with daddy, Camden and I went into the backyard with a pair of overalls and a giant lollipop and had fun with the camera.

BBQs and Surpise Ice Cream Parties

Happy September!

Good Lord, is summer almost over already? Didn't it just start? I swear we've barely gone to the beach!

...Oh yeah. We haven't gone to the beach much because it has rained every.single.weekend from late July through..now. Very funny God.

We had planned a small little barbecue between us and two other families in our townhome building that we are closest to since one of the families is leaving tomorrow for a week long cruise and school starts next week and oh yeah it's Labor Day weekend which means some sort of barbecue is required by law. But also because while our neighbors are gone on their cruise, Calen's favorite big buddy Kyle has his birthday. And a couple weeks later, Kyle's big brother Tyler has his birthday. So we devised a sneaky little plan to have a surprise little ice cream party for the birthday boys following the barbecue. 

The honorary almost 8 and 10 year old birthday boys

 The idea of a "little" ice cream party got more and more ridiculous as my other neighbor and I picked up more and more toppings, syrups and two pans of cupcakes. Hey, go big or go home. 

The spread

So we cleaned up the barbecue stuff and then sent Kyle and Tyler inside to "do something" while my other neighbor and I ran into our houses and grabbed all the goodies to set up outside. When the boys came back out, they were surprised with big birthday hats, two dozen cupcakes, three containers of ice cream, and TOPPINGS: whipped cream, gummy bears, gummy worms, marshmallow sticks, two bowls of sprinkles, cherries, and three different flavored bottles of syrup. 

Yeah, we went a little overboard didn't we? But hey, we were celebrating double birthdays. So that required double the fun.

Calen's "yummylicious" (according to him) ice cream

The kids sugared themselves up to the point of near sickness in 90 degree heat. Heat + sugar seems to create a deadly chemical reaction that sends kids into episodes of hyperactive hysteria. Some kids were belting out amazing renditions of "Party Like a Rockstar" and other classics on the karaoke machine that was brought outside. Other kids (ahem...mine) were leaping off picnic tables and stomping around the yard like some sort of Where the Wild Things Are reenactment. Babies were breakdancing (not mine) and stealing entire bowls of maraschino cherries off the table and devouring them, stems and all (sigh...mine.) It was a successful party.

Hmmm...I wonder who stole all the maraschino cherries? Definitely not Camden...

I've never seen my two little boys so ready for bed.

The birthday crew (minus the two babies)