Super Freak

So, I really enjoy using the word "freaking". Not nearly as much as it's cousin, the F bomb, but in a very poor attempt at censoring myself, I use freaking. A lot. In fact, I have quite a few words and/or phrases that ummmm, color my language. "For the love of god" is one. I attribute that to my Jersey days. It's just a very Jersey thing to say, I think. Oh, and along those same lines I say "oh my god, I almost died". "Crap" I say way too much, which is another pathetic try at not saying shit. Although I still say "shit" a lot too, a favorite phrase being "I don't give two shits..."

But anyways, I digress. Hmmmm, that's a word I don't use often enough. I'll have to remember that. Ok, back to what I was saying. About a month ago, my Dad was visiting and in the course of our conversation, I probably said "freaking" a good 5 times. Which he felt compelled to point out, saying "you know, you say freaking a lot, you should probably watch that or your kids are going to start saying it"

Arghhh... my Dad freaking jinxed me!

Today, I was standing on a step stool, digging out the finger paint from the top shelf in the craft closet (which EVERYTHING is on the top shelf in the craft closet, come on, you've read this blog, I can't leave anything lower!) While I was digging around, the bag of playdough fell and scared D1. Can you guess her response? Here it was: "Freaking playdough, you just freaked me out". Ahhhhh.... thanks Dad!

After I stopped laughing, I called hubby to tell him. And after he stopped laughing, he pointed out what a smart girl D1 is. She figured out how to use "freaking" two ways! As an adjective and a verb! Words can not fully express how freaking proud I am.

A Hit for Reality

This morning I took the girls outside. It's still a bit chilly, but we bundled up in sweatshirts and jeans, and were just fine. I spent the time outside working on a small garden bed. The girls dug for jewels and other mysteries, then they went onto the deck and played with some old flower pots - making "flower pizzas". I was just three steps below them in the yard. As I was listening to them chatter on about flower pizzas and dirt and jewels and other imaginary things, I smiled to myself, pleased with their little imaginations at work. As some of you who also blog may do as well, my mind wandered to a possible blog post about the morning. About how that moment felt so good, felt exactly like what I thought the joys and awards of parenthood would be like. My heart grew warmer as I mentally narrated the scene. Far off in the distance, I heard D1 whine about a crack in her pizza pot. As I knelt with my head down, from the corner of my eye I could see her coming towards me, but still I dreamed on.

And that's when she dropped the terra cotta pot onto my head. It broke into several pieces. ON MY HEAD. Ok, maybe you don't understand. She was on the deck, I was down on my hands and knees in the dirt. And she dropped a flower pot onto my head. My head broke the pot. Ok, do you understand now? The pain, I mean. I was lucky, it did not bleed - surprising since head wounds are supposed to bleed like crazy. But I guess I was lucky, nothing actually punctured my skin.

As I type this with one hand, the other hand holding ice to the lump that is forming on my head, I have to laugh, and once again remind all of you that parenthood is nothing like you think it will be. But it's certainly full of surprises.

Fame

So, I just wanted to let you all know that if you google "wiping someone else's bum" my site comes up #2 !

It's a proud, proud moment, my friends!

Say what?

There are phrases I have said in the last 3 yrs and 10 months that just never ever figured into the equation. I just never dreamed, ever, what Mothering would be like. It's hard to imagine what something is REALLY going to be like before you actually do it. When I worked as a buyer for accessories, it wasn't quite what I thought it would be when I was studying away for my Fashion Merchandising degree at IUP. But still, it was on the same plain of reality and logic that I had been on for quite a few years. My duties were orderly and reasonable. It wasn't like this. Even hearing that parenthood is nothing what you expect doesn't prepare you for such unexpectedness. Laying awake at night, stroking that big, pregnant belly and dreaming of what it will like doesn't even get close. Yes, you imagine that you will love the child like nothing you have loved before, and that certainly is true. And still doesn't measure up to the actual all-encompassing love that materializes. But I'm talking about how you imagine you will parent and interact with your child. Scared or not, judgemental or not, I'm sure you, like me, dreamed of picture perfect days filled with painting gardenscapes, exploring nature, cuddling to cartoons. And of course, lovingly teaching them the ways of acceptable conduct. Ooops! I think I just snorted my coffee through my nose on that one. I mean, what the hell was I thinking? I just had no idea what sort of things I would actually be saying to my children. No clue, really.

These for instance:
Ahhh, look at all this poo!
Poop goes into the toilet, not onto the floor.
Did you put an acorn in your pee pee?
Your Noggin isn't broken (and not be talking about their head!.)
We keep our clothes on when we are visiting our friends.
We don't wear pajamas in the shower.
Rocks can hurt heads.
You need bam bams for the boo boo's on your ba-ba's?
Dog food is for doggies!

Or even the mundane things that you somewhat expected to say, just not 5 times a day, every day for 2 years:

crayons are for paper, not walls!
don't hit your sister!
share!


I mean, really? I just had no clue! And then there are the things you ask your friends, things you thought you were never care about, let alone discuss:

How often does your baby poop?
What happened to your nipples?
How do you get 32 ounces of maple syrup out of the carpet?

I mean really, who knew? Ok, for the couple of people who read this regularly, please share with me a few of your "I can't believe I am saying this!" phrases. Show me I'm not alone, and give me a chuckle!

Remember Me?

So, It's been a while, I know. Sorry about that. I went away for a while. No, the place I went didn't end in "psychiatric center" or "rehab" or anything like that. Nope, my wonderful In-laws took the whole family to a Beaches Resort in The Turks and Caicos. It was AMAZING. Amazing. Really. A beautiful resort. Beautiful room. Breath-taking beaches. Wonderful service. The weather was perfect. 80's, sunny, breezy. Perfect, really. We had a large cast of characters with us. Hubby's whole family - parents, brother, sister-in-law, grandmother, Aunt, Uncle, two cousins, and us. 13 of us to be exact. Lots of mishaps, crying, laughing, drinking and lots and lots and lots of EATING. I felt like I was on cloud nine for four whole nights and days. My children were adorable, my husband was attentive and funny. The sun was shining, the heavens sang down on us. God, was it wonderful. Exactly what I needed to get myself out of a late winter slump.

Then we came back. Funny thing about vacations - they end. My Mother generously offered to come the day after we got back to help with the kids and let me rest after a long and late flight home. Well, ok, so I begged her to come. It was still generous of her to show up! My kids were, ummm, how do I say? A handful once we got back? A little out of sorts? Absolute monsters? Yeah, I think the last one is most precise. The plan for my Mom was to come and stay overnight then leave the next morning. Well, the next morning I was hit with an absolutely blinding and debilitating migraine. The sweet angel I call Mom put me to bed, gave me pills to knock me out, and took care of the monsters, errr, girls while I slept. I was in and out of consciousness that day. So I heard bits and pieces of life for my Mom. Actually, I felt like I was easedropping on myself for a day. Varying voices wafted up to me. Calm but stern ones, yelps of surprise. Hollers of "No"! The ever present phrases of my life "why would you DO that?" and "stop". Eerily familiar statements that I've been saying way too often, but haven't heard my Mom utter in at least 25 years.
Feeling better that evening, I hung with my Mom on the couch, chatting for a while. She informed me that I don't give justice to this blog. That I could be writing so much more! She, in fact, could write an entire book on just that one day! The wrestling, the fighting, the fibbing, the messes, the running, screaming, screeching, playing, dancing, scratching,pulling hair, singing chaos that is a day with my dear D1 and D2! And, best of all, she has promised me to testify on my behalf that they do not act this way because I'm upstairs locked in my room manicuring my nails all day! Nope, the things they do really happen in split seconds. VALIDATION!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yay Me! So, if you don't believe one of my posts that says I really was just gone for a minute, then you go ask my Mommy!

Broken

So they broke me. I'm certain. Cracked beyond repair. My mind is gone. Spirit gravely injured.

I woke at the usual time today, in the usual way: D1 arriving in my room at 7:30. But from there, things went a little differently. First of all, D1 greeted me with poop ass. What a duty, to wipe someone else's bum before you've even had time to wipe the crusties from your eyes. Then, as I gained more consciousness, I thought to ask - "where are your pants?" to which she replied "downstairs". Hmmmm... downstairs, already?

And so after collecting D2, we go downstairs. Where I find the refrigerator door propped open with a step stool. Pudding and juice on the counter. Then I head into the family room - tv is on. My little angel is so self sufficient, isn't she?

Breakfast is a mess. A lot of crying, pushing and fighting over cheerios. There's probably more to say, but I'm already starting the process of blocking it all out.

Ok, bath time! I've heard other people remark that bath time is such a fun, relaxing time in their house. Huh. Can I move in? Bath time in our house involves Mommy yelling not to dump ALL the water out onto the floor, and then very aggressively washing hair, because I haven't found any other way to get it done.

Ok, next I dare hop on the computer for a few minutes. Check email, send an email, and see if I can find any sort of free activity for the morning. Afterwards I come downstairs to see D2 covered in red sharpie marker. Her new pink pants stained already. And don't even dare ask why I would leave a sharpie out again, yeah, I know, I should have learned my lesson after the carpet incident. Well, here's the thing: I didn't actually leave it out. Well, yeah, I did, sort of, if you include leaving it on top of the fridge as "out". The little angels now know how to scale the sides to get the things on top. I'm going to have to start leaving things in nets on the very tops of our trees to keep them away from my sweet babies. I'll have to train pigeons to fetch stuff for me. My hubby was right, a helper monkey really would be wonderful.

Next comes trying to get them to go to a park to play for a while, take advantage of this crazy warm weather we are having. Well, after several meltdowns, in becomes apparent that they do not want to go outside. Ok, maybe D2 needs an early nap, she's still not feeling 100% after last week's bug. Into crib, and starts a 20 minute tirade. Out of bed. Ok, let's play in the basement. As I'm walking down to the basement, a friend calls and I attempt to have a conversation. Silly me. In the 10 minutes I'm on the phone, the girls unroll an entire thing of wrapping paper. Then begin to fight over it, which leads to a sword fight with the legs of a dismantled table. My friend remarks that my house sounds like a chinese take out kitchen. I'm thinking more like a cock fighting arena. I abruptly end the conversation when it becomes apparent that D2 has been injured by the sword fight.

Ok, lets have snack lunch! Snack lunch is when Mommy doesn't really feel like making "real" food. I bring out a bunch of snacks and let them eat it on the floor in basement. A relatively good time for a while.

As they are finishing up, I run upstairs to brush teeth and do a few things so we can go to the open gym time at our township building. A few minutes pass, and D1 comes upstairs. Naked. Informs me that D2 has made a mess in the kitchen. "but where are your clothes, D1?, Did you pee?". "Yes, Mommy, I did not make mess in kitchen". Which, for those of you who do not interpret 3 yr old speak, means "I made a mess, but blame my sister".

So I go downstairs. I find half a dozen eggs broken all over the floor, with half chewed pepperoni mixed in. Their clothes thrown on top. I big eggy disgusting mess.
Naked D1 climbs on top of the counter and starts to jump up and down saying "not me! not me!" D2 wines and cries because she can't scale to those heights.

I, I begin to cry. I call hubby, and tell him "I'm broken - they finally did it - they broke me" He tells me to put them in their rooms, and take a shower. Tells me to leave the eggs on the floor.

And that is what I do. D2 into her crib. I put the safety handle on D1's door so she can't get out. And I take a long, long shower. My shower has a little bench in it. I've never used it. I mean why would I? I did today. Sat there, head to knees and watched the water go down the drain.

Now, I'm writing this, with wet hair, wearing my bathrobe. I can't get myself to go downstairs and clean that mess. Nor can I get myself to go into D1's room to see the mess she has created in there.

Back into the swing of things

So D1's behavior was really, really good. For close to a month. The Holidays were not nearly as horrifying as I thought it would be, as far as her behavior went, that is to say. I even started getting a little nostalgic about it. Thought she was growing up, maturing. I started stressing over the blog even. What would I write about if I had a well behaved child? Nothing to complain over, no stories to make you laugh. Well, that's all wrong. D1 is back. Back with a vengeance. I've been so busying policing her and D2, I haven't had time to pee. Seriously, the last two weeks have been insane. Insane.

So what's been going on? Well, first of all, D2 is really coming into her own. She is becoming D1's accomplice in so many acts of vandalism, even creating her own.

Here is a short list of what they have been up to, once again, I've blocked out some of the things to conserve my sanity. Keep in mind, this is an incomplete list spanning just two weeks.

- squirted lotion all over bathroom floor

- wrote with a sharpie pen on the living room carpet (yeah, that doesn't come out)

- D2 drew on wall with bic pen (that doesn't appear to come out, either)

- dipped makeup brushes in lipstick (bye bye make up brushes)

- D1 dumped a bottle of Burts Oil in her hair. (oh, and then denied it. despite the obvious evidence of grease in her hair. Which, btw, took four hair washings to get out)

- smeared gel candle goop all over bathroom wall

- D2 wrote on brand new play kitchen set with marker

- bit off edges of almost every piece of a foamy puzzle

- stole ice cream container, and hid it and ate it in dining room. Left a crusty mess in carpet. Yum.

- D1 turned A/C and fan on before we went to bed one night, one night that was just 8 degree outside. We woke up at 1 am in house that was 50 degrees. Then coincidentally, I'm sure, the heater broke and we had to have it fixed on a Saturday.

And then there was the straw that broke the camels back. As I've outlined before, I really don't spend much, if any, time on myself. The one thing I do is put facial moisturizer on every day. It's special stuff for my sensitive skin. Well, they got into it and dumped most of it down the sink. I say most of it, because a nice glob of it also found its way onto D1's face. Which was rather humorous because when we caught them, she said she didn't do it, that it was just her sister. Hmmmm.

This one made me cry. Sob, actually. The usual Mom-esque statements. "I can't have anything nice!" "There is nothing that is my own anymore!" Blah, Blah, Blah. I even said "I don't feel like a human anymore!" To which my eloquent Husband replied "You're not human, you're a Mom now" ahem, yes he did!

So that's what I've been doing. Losing my mind. Slowly.

I'm going to make myself a cup of coffee now.