If you come over to our house, you might hear one of the following phrases:

1) “Put your pants on before you eat breakfast.”

2) “Do you WANT your teeth to fall out?”

3) “The cats aren’t bugging you. They love you. THEY LOVE YOU.”

4) “Don’t eat that. No, really, don’t eat that. I can’t believe you just ate that.”

5) “Yes, you do too have to put your pants on.”

Yes, I noticed there are two pants-related entries in this list. Which is both illuminating and embarrassing.

Background: we bought the movie “2012″ this week. Henry is VERY disturbed that there are people perpetuating some kind of crazy story about the end of the world, and has been doing some thinking, as you’ll be able to deduce from the following conversation recorded word for word.

Henry: Whyu do they spread rumors that the world will end? The world’s not going to end.

Daddy: Well, Henry, the world might end one day. We don’t know.

Henry: No, Daddy. The world won’t end until robots take over.

I just write it as I hear it, folks. I’m only the messenger here.

As a liberal arts major, I’ve had to read a LOT of poetry. And for the most part, say, like 95% of what I’ve read, poetry is not my favorite thing to read. I’m sure it’s got a lot of hidden value that I’m just not deciphering right, but frankly, I’ll take a Nathaniel Hawthorne snoozefest any day over Sylvia Plath.

That’s not to say that I don’t enjoy composing my own poetry. I mean, if Rosie O’Donnell can do it, I can do it too! Yeah! Maybe! Let’s see!

Bedtime

It’s 7:30
Time for bed
Wait – no.
It’s not time for bed!
It’s time to run around and laugh hysterically!
It’s time to jump on your sister!
It’s time to hide in the bathroom, and THEN jump on your sister!
Brush teeth.
With toothpaste.
Spit toothpaste everywhere. EVERY.WHERE.
Jammies go on, but first we must have Nekkid Running Through The House.
Quiet.
Kids are in bed.
They are not quiet. Oh, no.
Wine is in fridge.

Look at these twerps.

Making me smile and everything. I was grumpy that day, too. Dang kids.

This is Henry’s idea of posing for the camera.

This is Henry getting tired of posing for the camera. Quickly.

This is Emma with wet hair. She takes showers a lot. And she uses my deoderant, every time, even though we’ve talked about this. And she has her own Teen Spirit or some such fruity thing. But mine is apparently MUCH more attractive.

This is what happens when Emma gets a hold of Mom’s camera while she’s spacing out in the kitchen by the coffee maker trying to remember if she was supposed to volunteer in the Health Room or not.

This is James, my firstborn, the one who pretty much stole my heart the instant he arrived on the scene. He’s 15 and very serious. Except when he’s not, and he makes me laugh so hard that a little pee comes out. But you didn’t hear that from me. Don’t mention that pee part if I see you out and about, okay? It’s kind of an issue.

Sometimes, in the business of everyday life, I forget how good I’ve got it.

I’m silly that way.

I mean, it’s hard. It’s crazy busy. After all, I have three kids, a husband, three cats, and a huge, smelly dog. These all need tending. In fact, they need a LOT of tending. Especially the dog, because wow. Candles aren’t cutting it at this point, and he’s shedding like nobody’s business. Plus, he has horrible gas. I’m not even kidding. He can clear a room with one well-placed emission.

ANYWAY.

I love it all. The business, the craziness, the hecticness (that’s not a word, but I’m making it a word. Make a note of it.). I mean, what else would I be doing if it weren’t for this?

(If I gave it a few minutes, I bet I could think of a few things. But we’re going to disregard that.)

I’m definitely not a Super Mom. Super Moms do stuff like drive their kids to soccer practice while simultaneously authoring their opinion on managed healthcare and filling their gas tank. They always look good, like with actual makeup and EVERYTHING. They actually take showers! Daily! With soap!

I’m not a Super Mom, but I do have some pretty super sidekicks. I live in a small town in the Northwest that’s full of really gorgeous moms that look perfectly put together all the time, even at 7:30 in the morning dropping off the kids at school, which is hard, because hello? It’s 7:30 in the morning. I’m lucky if I remember to put my pants on at that time of day. I have a cute little house with a fun yard that I like to putter in (and hopefully keep the killing of plants to a minimum). I have not one, but TWO, minivans. Which puts me right up there with Mrs. Brady. Except mine doesn’t have wood panels and bench seats. I don’t do laundry, but I put it away. And I love, love, LOVE to cook. Like, for real. Really really real.

I might not be a Super Mom, but I did manage to put my pants on this morning. Does that count?

Since we’ve had three snow days this week (and with today’s blizzard, we’ll probably be out the rest of the week), all three kids are home. This isn’t much of an issue with Emma and James, since they find a lot of stuff to occupy themselves with: sledding, reading, painting, etc. However, with Henry, it’s a whole ‘nother ballgame.

Henry is our special needs kid, and as he gets older this becomes more prevalent. He’s falling further and further behind academically, socially, and emotionally, and this is something that we just have to deal with day by day. He is afraid of everything: horses, sledding, Polly Pockets (uh huh), you name it, he’s probably got some sort of sensory issue with it. Plus, he tends to scream whenever he’s frustrated, angry, or confused – which is most of the time. This makes for a pretty stressful time of it.

Dean and I pinch-hit with Henry. For the most part, we usually don’t get stressed with his behavior at the same time (unless he REALLY is on a roll), so if one of us is getting frustrated or burnt out, we can pass him off to the other one, or take the other one aside and remind them that we’ve got to be patient. This happened this morning, in fact.

I don’t know where I’m going with this, exactly. I guess that some days are harder than others. Henry has changed me profoundly in ways that I would never have imagined, and I’m grateful for that. It’s just that I never thought that the process would be so dang hard.

Well, we’re going on our third snow day here in the Portland area, and the fun is just unending here in my house: ceaseless sledding, Christmas treats and other baked goods popping out of the oven, and lots of snuggles by the fire trying to keep our poor frozen bodies warm. Tonight we played Uno and the kids were NUTS; Henry completely lost it at one point and was laughing so hard his face did that weird contortion thing that happens when you go past the point of polite laughter to the edge of peeing your pants. Good times!

This Sunday, Henry turns eleven, and he has been reminding us of this fact for, oh, I don’t know, months? Yes, that sounds about right.

Birthday celebrations commence today. He’s requested that we bring Oreos and licorice for the class; last year, we brought donut holes which I personally was a big fan of because I got to eat all the leftovers. This year, not so much.

He’s also let us know that he is in charge on Sunday, and that means of the remote control, the meal schedule, and where he sits in the car (he has called shotgun). Henry obviously has very specific ideas on how this birthday is going to go!

He’s asked for Mom’s homemade cinnamon rolls for his birthday breakfast; all the kids usually ask for them and I’m happy to oblige, even though they take about three hours to make (!). Then he wants Papa Murphy’s “paparoni” pizza, and he wants to watch the Garfield movie. After that, he’s pretty much done – that’s the pinnacle of his birthday wishes. Simple and easy to fulfill. Hopefully, we’ll have some snow to add to his joy!

My husband is a huge Star Wars geek. Huge. Like, he has action figures all over this desk, posters carefully placed in giant cardboard tubes, and at least ten Christmas ornaments that are currently on the tree (including one of Princess Leia in her Jabba the Hutt bikini. Huh.). So I knew this Christmas I wanted to get him something to add to his collection, something that he would totally go nuts over. So I hit Craigslist, and lo and behold, I found a walking, talking R2-D2 that is brand new in the box, only been used a couple of times, for $40. It originally sold for almost $200 last year, so I feel pretty proud of myself for being so cheap finding such a bargain.

So I had to be quite the sneaky girl yesterday in order to actually obtain this item. Since Dean and I both work from home, I made up a library errand (the gig was almost up when he decided he was going to go with me, but I gave him the slip) but I actually went to the Starbucks parking lot and met the nice lady who sold me this fun toy. It’s HUGE. I had to hide it in my closet underneath all my jammies; hopefully nobody will look there. Craigslist is awesome!

There’s something about the smell of a kid’s head, isn’t there?

All three of my kids have the same distinctive smell to their heads that they did when they were babies. I caught it on Emma and Henry’s heads today, and it sure sent me back: long nights nursing for hours watching old mysteries on PBS (both of these kiddos were avid nursers)….a squeaky clean baby all snuggled up in a warm towel after a bath in the sink….the sweet weight of a sleeping child on your shoulder.

I so enjoyed those times. One of the things I devoutly hope is waiting for me in heaven is a memory machine (for lack of a better term), so I can go back and relive all the tender moments that I would so love to experience just one more time. Like……

– walking hand in hand with my grandpa
– the first few weeks of all three of my children
– watching my toddlers do their toddler thing

And on, and on. I remember when these were actually happening thinking to myself “I’ve got to remember this! I’ve got to!” and for the most part, I have, but it’s the actual visceral, physical part of these memories that I would so love to experience again. Just one more time.